


Lit

by SleepsWithCoyotes



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: M/M, Not Captain America: Civil War (Movie) Compliant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-29
Updated: 2016-02-29
Packaged: 2018-05-23 23:49:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 30,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6134302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SleepsWithCoyotes/pseuds/SleepsWithCoyotes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The shifting of the light</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lit

**Author's Note:**

> Wordfic prompt was "illumination" from order_of_chaos. And yeah, apparently I really needed all the happy things to happen here, so it's 30K words of "here, lemme fix that for you."

Steve's room is smaller than Bucky's, but he doesn't have to share; it's all his. "Lucky you," Bucky tells him sometimes, his smile wry. He knows Steve envies his big family, though having Bucky is _like_ having a brother. They go everywhere together, get into scrapes and out again by the seat of their pants, always egging each other on. Bucky teases him constantly, grin never wider than when Steve gives as good as he gets. Just like brothers, that's them.

Hunching lower over his sketchbook, Steve listens to the squeak of tired springs as the bed shifts under him, too loud in the stillness of dawn. Outside his open window, the rattling growl of an engine turning over is punctuated by the slam of a door. Traffic's starting to pick up, the few hours when Brooklyn actually puts herself to bed slowly winding down.

None of this wakes the boy sleeping beside him, sprawled out with the abandon of a lazy dog, arms and legs flung everywhere. Steve's mother had offered to make up the loveseat--at Bucky's place they would have stolen the couch cushions for the night--but Bucky always sleeps in Steve's room when he stays over. They'd started out on the floor, Steve refusing yet again to sleep on a mattress when Bucky can't, and he doesn't really remember all of the argument that followed. He's been sick recently; it was a long argument. All the same, he's pretty sure he's the one who suggested they split the bed if his sleeping rough bothered Bucky that much.

Sometimes he really is just as big a chump as Bucky likes to claim.

Glancing sidelong, Steve studies the unselfconscious splay of Bucky's limbs, the limp curl of his fingers into his upturned palms. His head's turned towards Steve, lashes as thick and dark as a girl's fluttering in time with the twitch of his closed eyelids. He's been shooting up like a weed lately, but his body's keeping up with his bones, new muscle bulking on with every inch of height he gains.

Steve's room faces east, but the light's still pretty bad. It's early, and there's another building in the way, and even if the light _was_ good, he can't draw Bucky this way. The way he'd like to.

He sketches a quick cartoon instead, plays up the wild mess of Bucky's hair and the way he's mashed his cheek into the pillow, and shows it to Bucky before he's really awake, eyes soft and blinking.

Bucky catches him with an arm around his neck and scrubs his knuckles through Steve's hair until they match, grinning all the while.

***

Bucky can still remember when the long stretch between Thanksgiving and New Year's was something to look forward to, but times sure have changed since then. It's not just that Thanksgiving's kind of a joke, and no one's bothering with a fancy tree with nothing much to put under it. He's plenty thankful, actually: whatever's happening overseas, they're still not at war yet, and he's still got his folks, his sisters, Steve.

Steve's the reason he hates this time of year, not that he'd ever let on. It's too cold; there's too much snow, and it stays dark for way too long. It's pitch black out when Bucky leaves their apartment for work, and most days it's pitch black when he gets home. He knows Steve gets out--he's out there in the cold way too often for Bucky's peace of mind--but every winter he just seems to get paler and paler as the days go on until spring finally comes back around.

It's past ten when Bucky gets in, still shedding a crust of snow from the cuffs of his pants even after kicking off the worst of it on the stoop outside. His arms feel like lead, the muscles in his back so tight they're a painful kind of numb, but no way is he turning down extra hours if they're on offer. He's lucky: the foreman likes him, knows he does good work. Bucky's always on the short list when these windfalls come along.

He tries to be quiet as he shuts and locks the door, figuring Steve will have hit the sack already. Turns out he's only half right. The light in the kitchen's still on, and the place smells too good for it to be from either of their cooking. The half-full pot of soup on the stove is still warm when he curves a frozen hand to it, but he's not worried about Steve burning the place down. He's worried about the nearly untouched bowl on the kitchen table, the narrow figure slumped beside it, head pillowed on one skinny arm.

"Steve?" Bucky asks, peeling off his other glove and fumbling with the buttons on his coat. "You okay?"

There's a moment when he can't even hear Steve's breathing, but before he can close the two steps between them to shake him, just to make sure, Steve sucks in a heavy breath and lifts his head with a start.

"Bucky?" he mumbles, wincing a little as he straightens in his chair.

"Right here, Sunshine," Bucky says, finding a grin even though his heart still feels tight in his chest.

"Ugh. Guess I fell asleep." Steve rubs at his face with his thin hands, fingers and palms all out of proportion with the rest of him. He would probably have been a pretty big guy if he hadn't been so sick all his life. Bucky tries to picture that sometimes, but Steve's the one with the imagination, and Steve's just...Steve. Hard to ask for much more than that. "Oh--Mrs. Gleason says thanks for fixing her sink," he adds, nodding towards the stove.

"She didn't have to do that," Bucky huffs, shaking his head. "Done it enough times for my Ma, ain't I? I _was_ wondering when you'd learned to cook...."

Steve narrows his eyes, but with a wry half-grin that reminds Bucky that they're both bachelors, and what does he expect? "I don't hear you complaining when it's my night."

"And bite the hand that feeds me? Ma didn't raise no dummies." Turning back to the stove, he lights the burner again and turns the heat down low, jerking his chin at Steve's bowl. "Want me to heat that back up for you?"

" _No_ ," Steve says instantly, making a face and pulling the bowl back towards him. It's got to be stone cold by now. "You'd just dump it back in the pot."

Bucky snorts. "Ain't worried about your germs."

"Well, maybe I am."

The grin falls off Bucky's face. "You okay?" he asks again, wanting to go over there and press his wrist to Steve's brow. His Ma always uses her wrist to check their temperatures, never her palm. She says it's more accurate, but it seems...safer that way. Less like he's reaching to touch.

Steve shakes his head without looking up. "I'm fine. Just don't want to get you sick, is all."

He wants to tell Steve that he's healthy as a horse, and most days he would. It's just that some days it feels like he's rubbing it in.

The light in their kitchen is terrible, just a dim bulb that turns the white walls yellow and washes out Steve's face even more. But tomorrow will be better--tomorrow's Sunday, and if neither of them have work, they'll sit around this table again after church with the curtains pulled open and the weak winter sun shining through. They'll be bundled up in layers, but he'll find some way to make Steve laugh, and everything will be fine. Winter may be his least favorite time of year, but they'll pull through. They always do.

***

Between Erskine's serum and Stark's machine, Steve has plenty to be worried about, but he's never been afraid of needles. He's been too sick too often to have that luxury. It's the machine that makes him nervous, but he tries not to show it. He's fifty percent certain he succeeds.

He still can't believe that he's really here, that it's really happening, and it's that disbelief that scares him most of all. When he'd first gotten into the program, he hadn't dared to hope. It just sounds so crazy, so _desperate_ , that he hasn't said anything to anyone, not even now that he's been picked. He still has his pride.

_That pride's gonna get you killed someday._

"I know, Buck," he says through clenched teeth, staring at the closed lid of Stark's machine as it lights up with electricity, growing brighter by the moment.

He should have written a letter. He hasn't even told Bucky he enlisted, because then he'll have to explain. He should at least have written _something_ , because if anything goes wrong--

At first he thinks his skin is crawling, but no--it goes deeper than that. He's already closed his eyes against the glare of the vita-rays, but now they snap open onto a hot white glow that matches the inferno lit inside his bones. He feels the needles pull out of his skin, but it's barely a prickle; the shudder that wracks his entire frame threatens to crack him open from the inside out.

His first scream takes him completely by surprise.

***

There's a broad shoulder under Bucky's arm that he doesn't recognize and a scent that he does, one that nothing can make him forget. Not the reek of unwashed bodies, not the mildew of the camps when it rains or the ever-present stench of machine oil on the assembly floor after they were captured. Not even the chemicals and antiseptic of that bastard Zola's private lab can drive this scent out, because it's Brooklyn summers and dry paper and a kid too big for his body. It's _Steve_ , and even though Bucky's probably out of his head from some new injection, he doesn't care. Steve's here and the whole damn place is on fire, so that's two of his fondest wishes, right there.

Steve looks weird, though. He looks _huge_ , but that's the face Bucky knows, even if Steve's cheeks have filled out, and he looks...he looks healthy.

Bucky considers very seriously for two whole minutes that he might actually have broken under torture and _lost his mind_ , but he's already feeling better. He can walk, and though he doesn't want to turn loose of Steve--it's not often he has an excuse to hang on--he can _walk_ , damn it. He's going to walk out of here under his own power if it kills someone, and part of him hopes it does. There's a part of him that wants to see a whole lot of people dead for this, so long as none of them are Steve Rogers.

"Did it hurt?" he has to ask, because Jesus, how could it not have? He remembers his own growth spurts, and that had been spread out over a couple of years. Steve looks like he's grown a foot in, what, months? Less?

"A little," Steve admits, which for anyone else would be a harrowing tale of overwhelming agony. Bucky maybe knows a little more than he'd like to about that.

"Is it permanent?" God, he hopes he doesn't sound like a jerk about it, but he can't decide which would be worse: for Steve to have finally gotten everything he ever wanted only to lose it again or for it to _be_ permanent and turn Steve into somebody else. He's seen it before, girls who turn pretty and lose every speck of kindness, guys who get big enough to fight and forget how to do anything else. He doesn't want to think that Steve could ever change, but Jesus, look at him.

"So far," Steve says with a hint of impatience, looking back but not at him.

Shit. _Shit_.

And there's no damn time to apologize or explain, because the whole place is about to blow. It's not the munitions they've been forced to manufacture for Hydra; someone must have rigged the base in case it ever got captured. The explosions he can hear--too crisp and too clear--are too regular to be an accident.

Steve leads him up, so they go up, staggering along catwalks that rattle and quake with each detonation. Heat blasts up from below, the air thick with smoke. They must be heading for the roof, but he doesn't ask why or what the plan is once they get there. He trusts Steve, and even if it means they've got nothing but a long drop and an unpleasant stop ahead of them, he can't imagine being anywhere else.

He fixes his eyes on the broad shoulders ahead of him, and by the yellow glow of the fire below and the popping bulbs overhead, he keeps himself moving, fast as he's able, refusing to fall behind.

***

Steve hadn't let himself think that Bucky might be dead, but now that he's here, alive, marching gamely beside him with a few hundred other prisoners at their backs, he almost can't believe it. He has to believe that they'll make it back, because he got them into this: broke all of them out without thinking ahead, arranged for _one_ plane to come back and make an extraction when it's clear he needs a dozen. They're going to have to walk back, all of them, and he hopes to God there's enough strength left in them all for another fight, because they're sure to see one soon enough.

They're trying to be quiet, but they've got a tank with them, so they're probably not succeeding very well. Worse yet, they'd been thirty miles on the wrong side of enemy lines when they started. Steve doesn't know how far they've come in the last few hours, but too many of the men are leaning on their fellows already, limping along as best they can. Not Bucky, though; Bucky's good, staring sharp-eyed into the dark of the woods when just hours ago he'd been strapped to a table, slurring drunkenly as his eyes refused to focus.

Steve misses the weight of Bucky's arm around his shoulders, the warmth of him pressed to his side.

Bucky's eyes never stop scanning the trees, but every so often they start to slide past Steve and get hung there. The first few times, Bucky actually jerks a little, like he's forgotten or just can't believe what he's seeing. Steve had done the same thing at first each time he looked in the mirror, but the fifth or sixth time, Steve has to ask.

"What?"

Bucky shakes his head, dragging his eyes away. "Nothing. ‘S just...." His jaw tightens, hands flexing on the rifle he claimed on their way out. "I saw a lot of weird stuff in there," he says at last, voice low. "After a dose. Hard to know what's real and what isn't with you looking like that."

Steve swallows. It keeps his voice from cracking as he swears, "It's real. It's all real. I--I should've written--"

"Nah," Bucky says with a faint grin, eyes glittering in the gloom as he glances Steve's way again. "I'd have figured you'd given up drawing and taken up writing for the pulp rags instead. But you look good," he adds, so honest that Steve hates himself a little for wondering even for one moment whether Bucky had been jealous of the changes. "Way I always figured you'd look if you hadn't been so sick."

He stumbles so badly Bucky has to catch his elbow, but he's too busy gaping to care. "Serious?"

"Sure," Bucky says easily. "You always had the hands for it, didn't you? Like a Lab pup when he's still all paws."

It's how utterly earnest Bucky's expression goes on that last bit that gives him away, but Steve just elbows him gently in the side, muttering, "Jerk."

"Punk," Bucky huffs, nudging him back and grinning for all he's worth.

Steve doesn't mind. He knows which parts Bucky had been teasing about and which he hadn't.

He figures he'll have Bucky right beside him for the rest of the trip, just like old times, but it doesn't last. Bucky tears his eyes from the trees long enough to glance just once at the ragtag band at their back, and then he's gone, slipping back through the ranks and quietly pulling the men into some kind of order. _Sergeant_ , Steve reminds himself as he listens to Bucky work his magic, encouraging and cajoling, voice steeling now and then. Having the rank just gives Bucky a free pass to be himself.

Steve doesn't begrudge the fact that Bucky has more people to look out for, that his mother-henning tendencies have a broader focus these days. But he can't say he isn't pleased when Bucky makes his way back to Steve's side as soon as possible, taking up position on his left as the sun begins to rise.

In the light of early morning, Bucky looks pale and drawn, thinner than Steve remembers, and his eyes as they scan the trees are harder than Steve's ever known them to be.

He's also the most amazing thing Steve has ever seen.

***

Bucky wakes to pain and brilliant white, but it's not snow glare this time. It's a hospital but not a field hospital. There are concrete walls and glass and...he's strapped down to a table. Why is he strapped down?

The lights fixed on him remind him of searchlights, big and round and too damn bright. The doctors break the glare a little as they approach: three of them, and one of them's holding the weirdest contraption Bucky has ever seen. Is that some kind of ray gun? A really messed up drill?

The lights blind him as his eyes open wide. He'd really like to squeeze them shut, but he's screaming his damn head off and can't control that either, so he's not surprised that he can't.

Not a drill, no.

It's a saw.

***

Steve can't get drunk. He's suspected this for a while, but he's been telling himself that maybe he just hasn't been trying hard enough.

Well, now he has--he's tried _so hard_ \--and all he has to show for it are a few empty bottles and memories that won't stop circling in his head. Peggy sits with him for hours in the wreckage of the bombed-out bar where the Howling Commandos first came to be, and it turns into a kind of--

It's a wake, but he can't let himself think about that right now.

"I was always getting into fights," he says, turning an empty tumbler around and around on the scarred table between them. "Learned how to fall and take a punch long before I joined the army. Bucky...he used to jump in at first, just wipe the floor with however many there were. You should've seen him fight," he says to the table, stubbornly pouring another glass. "He was something else."

"At first?" Peggy asks, voice kind, expression arch. "You mean to say he ever stopped?"

Steve laughs, and it hurts, but she's right. "No, he never did. But I yelled at him this one time, told him I could handle my own fights. I was full of it," he admits with a snort, "he knew it and I knew it, but he just said, ‘Not with that stance, you can't. You're leaving yourself open, see?' And then he showed me. I was never any good at putting it into practice--just didn't have the weight--but...he never wrote me off, even when...when anyone could see I was just fooling myself."

The hand that reaches to cover his is warm and strong, but some part of him expects it to be bigger, with different calluses from different guns. "He was a good friend," Peggy says.

He nods, staring at their joined hands. There's not much else he can do.

By the time the sun rises, Peggy has long since gone to bed, but despite the lack of a hangover, the light still hurts his eyes.

***

_Flash_ , and the soldier is awake. His eyes open on searing, round lights. This is familiar. He will find he is strapped down if he moves, so he doesn't move. Green-masked men in green scrubs bustle around him, clearing away their equipment. There will be blue-masked men in blue scrubs next to test and recalibrate the soldier's arm. He lies still. Talk slowly picks up around him. Not Russian this time. German. He has probably been moved again.

When they let him sit up, a tall man in a white coat white comes to stand before him. He wears a silver pin on his lapel, a skull with many arms. The man in white is afraid. He speaks in harsh tones with a curl to his lip, but the soldier can see the way the man's pulse jumps in his neck.

The soldier is no longer strapped down. He could break that thin neck before the man finishes his sentence. He sits and waits and listens.

"After the tests, there will be an assignment," the man in white is saying. "To reach the target, you will need to climb. Equipment may not be available, so training will be provided."

The soldier waits. He is receiving his orders. The man in white looks impatient.

"Do you understand?"

The soldier nods. He is confused. He understands everything. Why would the man in white think he wouldn't? The confusion is familiar.

"Bauer!" the man in white snaps; another man in white hurries to his side. This one is younger, fitter, wears a gun under his white coat. His fear shows in his eyes. "Take the asset to be evaluated, then to the obstacle course. Mountain training begins immediately. We are on a tight schedule."

"Understood," says the man named Bauer. That must be the proper response to orders in this place. He will remember it, but he feels no urgency to speak. The nod did not merit correction. It will suffice. "Up," Bauer says, speaking to the soldier. "Follow me."

He has his orders. He follows.

The hallway beyond is very dark, is not familiar.

Few of the places he wakes ever are.

***

Steve bursts out of the strange room--was that a movie set? It looked like something from the USO tours--and tears through a crowd of men in dark suits, sober as undertakers. He pulls his punches, settles for pushing his way through; he'd expected enemy soldiers, but it's like being set upon by a mob of bankers. Whoever they are--government agents, maybe--he doubts they're a threat. Those suits belong to a much higher pay grade.

Slamming through a pair of glass doors--and there's so _much_ glass it's eerie; aren't they worried about being bombed?--he stumbles out onto a street he doesn't recognize. Cars whiz past him on either side, but they're not the right shape. The words he's heard have all been in English, but this can't be America or England, and it doesn't make sense. Where the hell is he?

He takes off running. He's not hoping for extraction at this point; he'll settle for escape and a chance to get his bearings. There'll be a paper somewhere--this looks like a city; there are always papers--and maybe the locals won't be on their guards just yet. Maybe there'll be someone who can answer his questions, like where did all these weird-looking cars come from, and all these people dressed in fashions he's never seen, all these tall buildings and _lights_.

He sprints out into a wide-open square that's almost familiar, but everywhere he looks, instead of brick and mortar he sees glass and steel and movie screens. A hundred different features are playing at once, but they don't make sense--it's just flashes of people and objects and words, constantly flickering from image to image with no time to figure out what any of it means. The people on the street walk past without looking up at all, the screens--moving billboards?--utterly ignored. They don't even see them.

Faltering, Steve slows to a jog then stops, turning a helpless circle as he tries to get his bearings. No one sees the screens. No one sees him. He's invisible and he doesn't know where he is.

He realizes he's wrong about at least one thing when half a dozen black cars surround him. "At ease, soldier!" someone calls out, voice so assured Steve feels the reflex of a salute shiver in his spine. Tearing his eyes away from the men pouring out of the cars--more bankers, Jesus, but also a few who look like proper soldiers--he turns and finds himself staring.

It's not that the man approaching him is black that throws him. It's that he's _dressed_ all in black, in a long, dramatic coat and--and he's wearing an eyepatch of all things, like a pirate, when the one resource this city clearly doesn't have a shortage of is glass.

"Look," Eyepatch says as he strolls closer, no tension at all in his stride. "I'm sorry about that little show back there, but...we thought it best to break it to you slowly."

Steve's still breathing hard, though that run hadn't been nearly enough to wind him. It's just that the sheer strangeness--the noise, now that he's paying attention--is creeping up around his neck and strangling the breath from his lungs.

"Break what?" he asks, half-disbelieving already.

Eyepatch is silent a long moment, but his expression never changes. He's warier than he looks, or...maybe he's just worried how Steve will take what he's about to say. "You've been asleep, Cap," he says at last. "For almost seventy years."

Seventy...seventy _years_? It sounds like a joke, like a really bad trick, only...the screens. The glass. The bored people all around who aren't thinking about things like air raids and blackout curtains and falling bombs. The war must be over, but he doesn't even know if they'd won. If Bucky had...if it'd all been for nothing.

"You gonna be okay?" Eyepatch asks, real concern in his tone this time.

"Yeah," Steve says, trying to wrap his head around it. "Yeah, I just...."

He wishes Peggy were here. She'd step in, cool and determined, and shake down Eyepatch for information until he was ready to give up his grandmother's name and secret recipe. Or Bucky, who'd smile and joke and be everyone's pal, and come back to Steve an hour later with the plans to the base and maybe a convert to the cause. God, he misses them both, but thinking about Peggy hurts less. The last he'd known, she'd been alive.

"I had a date."

***

"Fury," the man he reports to says. "Nicholas J. Your next target."

The soldier has reported to many men, but this one has been a relative constant. The man's subordinates call him ‘Pierce' and ‘Mr. Secretary'. He has been there the last eight times the soldier has awakened, though he barely resembles the man he was that first time. He ages rapidly, unlike the others--all new faces, every time--or the soldier. Perhaps that's why his orders are always so urgent.

The soldier waits. The cold from his left shoulder is still seeping into his bones, chilling his heart. The breath in his left lung feels too dry.

"He's smart," Pierce says, turning away from the soldier to stare at a picture on a screen. The screen is much larger than it was last time. The colors are sharper. The picture on the screen--his target--is not familiar. "Cautious. He's not going to be easy to take down. Collateral damage is not a problem for this man," Pierce adds, turning back to watch the soldier carefully.

He understands. The target is not a man who will hesitate to put others in danger. He can't count on the presence of civilians to be a weakness.

Pierce is silent a moment longer, but then he smirks with a snort of laughter. He looks oddly satisfied. It's confusing but familiar.

"I want a confirmed kill in twelve hours," Pierce says, voice going stern. "See to it."

He goes. There has been no training this time; he must already possess all the skills he needs.

A team of men is waiting for him, but he pays them little mind. Eight of them split up between three dark vehicles of a type he's never seen before, a style of truck he's not familiar with. He settles into the back of one and watches the man behind the wheel. The truck handles the same as any other. He could drive it if he has to. It's not important.

They are driving him to the place he will be expected to begin when they receive word that the target is already on the move, that a team sent in before them has failed to neutralize Fury. The soldier remains silent while the others curse and exclaim. Orders may have been exceeded. It's possible they aren't trusted. It makes no difference. He lets them drive him to the new kill zone. 

When the target evades even him, he begins to understand.

The three men with him are arguing.

"It's Nick Fury," one man insists, keeping his voice down as if afraid to be overheard. "He's probably got bolt holes all over the city--all over the damn _world_. If Pierce thinks we're going to be able to find him in twelve hours--"

"Relax," says the man on the soldier's left, the only one sharing the back seat with him. He's broad and unshaven, not quite past his prime, and there's a spark in his eyes the soldier recognizes every time they cut his way. This one wants to order him, wants to see how long he can endure. "It's gonna be a cakewalk."

The soldier has no orders to protect his team.

"Yeah?" the driver says doubtfully. "Wish I had your confidence, Rumlow, but I'm sure not seeing where it's coming from."

"Think about it. Who do you trust when you're the man who trusts no one?"

The man in the passenger's seat turns half around, saying, "You think he's with Ro--" His eyes cut nervously to the soldier as he swallows. "With that guy?"

"Guess we'll find out," Rumlow says, settling back into the seat. He glances at the soldier but doesn't lose his grin.

The soldier ignores him. That look is familiar. It has no bearing on his mission.

It's easier when they give him an address and let him out of the truck. His mind clears as he follows his training, checking first for mechanical surveillance, then for human. Humans are easier to evade. Cameras pose more of a problem.

He takes to the rooftops once he spots the narrow corridor that will keep him hidden. The cameras in this area aren't synced as well as they could be, as if they've been placed to fool both enemies and the man they're meant to protect. The physical assessment he undergoes each time he wakes leaves him sore but limber: a leap, a scramble and a crouching sprint sees him settling down to wait.

The apartment window he watches is dark but not completely. A faint light shines from the kitchen area. His mind is clear as he waits. Waiting makes everything simple.

When someone enters the apartment at last, he tenses. He can't see the face at first, but the hands that he can see belong to a fair-skinned man in his prime. This is not his target.

The man in the apartment freezes. He has not seen the soldier. He sees something else. He turns on one light, but another goes off. There is someone in the corner of the room.

The soldier trains his rifle on that section of wall, calculating the presence of the man he can't see by the angle of the other man's body. His hands are steady and slow. He breathes in, out. He pulls the trigger.

The first shot takes out a chunk of the apartment wall. The man in the apartment starts, but he moves forward, not back. His hands fly up towards something the soldier can't see, fingers spread to grasp. The soldier puts two more shots through the initial hole he made, certain now that he's found his mark.

A man falls. He's dark-skinned, his head bald and bare. The soldier spots the eyepatch as the man in the apartment stoops to drag the target to safety. The soldier is supposed to confirm his kill. The soldier--

The man in the apartment is bent over. He is dragging the body. His face is--

His face--

The soldier is still. This is the correct protocol when there are things he doesn't understand and he is not in imminent danger of failing the mission. He will observe and categorize and wait to understand. He has time. And there is something unusual about that man's face.

He wants to see it again.

He's not surprised when the man breaks cover, ducking down to peer out the window after him. (This is...familiar?) He's never seen this face before, but there's a flash inside his head like something wants to be there. He waits to see blood on snow--that is familiar--but there's nothing. Nothing.

It's time to move. He finds his targets and then he disappears. That's how his missions go.

The man's face goes with him.

***

The truth is, Steve rarely has to fight all-out. There's not many people who can match both his speed and his strength, and the specialized training he's been getting from SHIELD has taken all of Bucky's lessons and the bit of raw talent he'd started with and polished him up sharp. Mostly when he pushes himself it's because there are friendlies in the line of fire and he's got more than his own skin to worry about.

Fighting the Winter Soldier demands everything he's got. It's not just the arsenal, though when the third gun comes out, Steve nearly has a Tony moment, almost blurts, " _Really_?" He's fast--God, is he fast; it's like fighting the Asgardian version of Natasha--all of his blows coming with his entire strength behind them. He's like a machine, one opened up to full throttle that only knows how to plow straight through everything in his path. The scary part is that he's completely human other than that arm; Steve knows. The blows of his fists and his feet hit meat and not metal as often as not, but it's not enough to bring the Winter Soldier down.

There's no way the guy's not feeling it, so there's no way he's unaugmented. A mutant, maybe, or maybe it's something else. All Steve knows is that some of the blows he's landed would have dropped an ordinary assassin...but then, an ordinary assassin couldn't have buried Steve's own shield halfway through a van on a single throw.

Steve's not pulling his punches either, dishing out body blows that ought to be splintering ribs while desperately avoiding precise swings of a knife that switches hands like lightning. Steve gets him to drop one knife, but of course there's another--there's always another--though Steve nearly misses it as a kick to the gut sends him flying back into a parked van. It's the one his shield is sticking out of, which might come in handy if he can just get five seconds to pull it free.

He manages, just, but the shield doesn't even things up as much as he'd like. That knife is just everywhere, but it's not the worst threat. Even the Soldier's human fist packs one hell of a wallop, and he's starting to get the cold, cold feeling that he could break every bone in the man's body and the assassin would just keep coming.

He isn't thinking of covers or identities when he grabs the black mask that covers the lower half of the Winter Soldier's face. It's just a convenient handhold as he tries throwing the man off-balance. All he wants is breathing room, but the assassin flips with uncanny agility, landing hard but rolling right back up to his feet as his mask clatters to the street between them.

Steve just wants two seconds to get his wind back, but the Winter Soldier gives him three--just stands there for a silent moment with his back to Steve. Maybe the mask is more important than Steve realizes. He has the horrible thought that it might be someone from SHIELD, someone he's worked with and considers a friend--or maybe he's just looking at the back of a thoroughly enraged assassin who's going to kill him twice for exposing his face.

And then the Winter Soldier turns and it's...God. It's so much worse than either of those things, so impossible Steve can barely believe his eyes. It's half dream and half nightmare, but he knows what he sees.

"Bucky?"

"Who the hell is Bucky?" his friend asks, and it's Bucky's voice, Bucky's face, Bucky's human hand lifting _another damn gun_ \--

Sam comes in fast before Bucky can fire, and no, _no_ , this shouldn't be happening--he should not be watching Bucky roll to his feet, thoughts flickering fast across his face that are discarded in the instant he takes aim to shoot again.

In the split-second Bucky hesitates, Natasha nearly blows him up, but Steve can't draw a single breath to try to stop either of them. He winces away from the explosion as a truck goes up in flames, and when he turns back, Bucky's gone.

He feels like the whole world's dropped out beneath him, his stomach doing a sick roll that leaves him rooted to the spot for far too long, staring at the flames where Bucky had stood just moments before. Bucky was _there_. He was _right there_...and he hadn't known Steve at all.

He hadn't even seemed to know himself.

***

Mission only half-finished, the soldier returns to base. The two he's been sent to kill have been captured by people who mean to kill them. It may be enough.

He doubts it, but his arm needs work, and his body is no longer operating at peak efficiency. And he has...questions.

He should not have questions, but that is...that....

He does not want that to be familiar, because where questions lead is a blank to him.

In this place the people who work on him are all in white. One sits on a stool at his left, repairing his arm, while another passes tools when needed. Another monitors a computer that is hooked up to the chair. The chair is not comfortable, but it's not made to be.

He sits quietly. There are guards in the room--a commandeered bank vault, the necessary machinery brought in temporarily--but they face the exits, their backs to him. Listening to the crackle and snap of electricity, the hiss of a welding torch, he lets his eyes drift out of focus and tries to understand. The man on the bridge is the man from the apartment, and he _knows_ this man. Not the face: he only knows that from the glimpse he snatched on the roof and the pictures they showed him before they sent him out. He knows the man is his target, but they haven't given him a name this time, just the photograph.

But he knows him. So there should be _something_ in his head, but there's just nothing. It's like his guns: no one ever showed him how to aim, how to fire; it's something he was born knowing, so much a part of him that he never needed any instruction. If the man is like that...if he's a _piece_ of the soldier...why is that man his mission?

He reaches back inside his head, tries to remember, but there's just...falling. Snow. Blood. A man he hates beaming over him and the ice of the cryochamber dragging him under.

He moves before he knows he means to, his newly-repaired arm lashing out and slamming the nearest technician away from him. The guards at the exits spin around, guns trained on him, but he ignores them, fists clenched, breathing hard. He...remembers. Right before he fell. Before the snow and the blood and the saw. There'd been a man, and he'd yelled a name.

It's...the same. The same name. As the bridge.

There's an argument at the door, but he ignores that. Not important. He needs to think, but his head is splitting. The name is important. The man is important. If he can just think--

His head lurches sideways as the back of a hand crashes across his cheek, but in the instant he's hit, he recognizes the blow. Pierce. The man he reports to. This is familiar. He is not to kill this one. Instead he asks for intel.

"There was a man on the bridge," he says, looking up with a frown. "Who was he?"

"You met him earlier this week on another assignment," Pierce says, but he looks uncomfortable. He doesn't back away, but his eyes won't settle.

"I knew him," the soldier says, eyes sliding past Pierce automatically. The technicians have crept back in, and there are more guards now as well. Rumlow is one of them. Pierce is the one he must...watch?

Pierce is nervous. He licks his lips as he searches for words but reaches for the technician's stool to sit. It puts him lower than the soldier, makes him seem more vulnerable. The soldier knows that neither of these things are true.

"Your work has been a gift to mankind," Pierce says, his voice steady and sure. "You shaped the century. And I need you to do it one more time."

The soldier looks away. He knows he shouldn't; they say it makes him look willful. Ungrateful. But he's...tired.

"Society's at a tipping point between order and chaos," Pierce explains earnestly, "and tomorrow morning we're going to give it a push. But if you don't do your part," he adds almost kindly, "I can't do mine. And Hydra can't give the world the freedom it deserves."

He knows that; he _knows_. Pierce tells him every time. And he's not...he wants...freedom is important. It's just....

"But I knew him," he gets out, voice turning rough on the last word. His throat wants to close and he doesn't know why.

Pierce heaves a sigh, and for a moment he thinks he's forgiven. That Pierce will explain. The soldier has never failed a mission, but has a mission ever...changed? Has...he ever said--

"Prep him," Pierce orders as he rises, turning away.

For a moment the soldier's eyes feel hot. It...didn't work. He's--

"He's been out of cryofreeze too long," a technician murmurs uncertainly.

( _failed_ )

"Then wipe him and start over."

The soldier's face twists. It's not a good expression. He knows better than to let it show, but his control is slipping.

The technicians push him back into the chair, hands firm. Pierce stands and watches. The guards watch too. One of them is Rumlow. He watches very closely.

The technicians give the soldier the bite guard before the restraints close around his arms. They know he won't be able to open his mouth once the metal bands engage. His muscles lock, lungs heaving before the electroplates even descend, already sparking before they close around his head.

He tells himself he'll be silent. He'll endure.

He never does.

***

There's a moment on the helicarrier when Steve thinks: _Maybe_. Bucky's planted himself between Steve and the helicarrier's server--the only thing Steve possibly could be after in this otherwise empty bay--but he's just standing there. Bucky's expression isn't anything Steve would call friendly, and there's no recognition in his eyes at all, but he's not moving. He hasn't drawn a weapon. He doesn't _need_ one, but God, it's tempting to hope.

"People are going to die, Buck. I can't let that happen," he tries, but Bucky's dead-eyed expression doesn't change. Not even the suit Steve's borrowed from the Smithsonian seems to be reaching him, and after all the ribbing Bucky used to give him over it, he almost feels cheated. "Please don't make me do this," he begs. He doesn't even care that he's begging. He'd do a lot worse for Bucky in a heartbeat.

He doesn't know how long that strange stalemate might have gone on--

***

There is a man standing in front of him. This man is his mission. His mission is--is to--

( _stop_ )

His mission is to stop him. He is stopped.

The soldier waits.

***

\--but the clock is ticking, and he can't wait for Bucky to wake up or make up his mind. Steve makes the first move, and it's so much harder this time, because he knows who he's fighting--but at the same time, it's easier, too. It was one thing when he only had to worry about getting himself off the helicarrier once he hijacks the ship's targeting system with Fury's server blade, but he knows Bucky isn't going to come quietly, and he needs to take that into account. If it's up to him to get them out of here, he can't pull any punches.

He thinks he's gained himself some time when he knocks Bucky out--

***

He cannot breathe. His mission wants the device the soldier took from him. He doesn't know what the device is, but his mission is to--

( _stop_ )

\--him, and he has stopped him. He could break the device, but the man wants it. He does not break the device.

He cannot breathe.

He is stopping now.

***

\--but it doesn't last. He should have guessed that Bucky would have some sort of accelerated healing, just like him, and he's known almost his whole life that nothing keeps Bucky down for long. Only Bucky doesn't scramble up after him this time; he--

***

His left arm is steady as he lifts the gun. His mission moves in straight lines without looking back. The shot is clear.

He pulls the trigger.

***

\--shoots Steve in the leg, and he goes down, but not for long. It's a through-and-through that tears a hole in the meat of his thigh, but it misses bone and arteries alike. He heaves himself up, makes another leap for a handhold higher on the server platform--

***

He sights again along his steady arm. Breathes in. Breathes out.

Pulls.

***

\--and the next shot hits him in the shoulder. He nearly loses his grip on the rung he's just grabbed, a bark of pain escaping as he dangles one-handed. He wants to yell down at his silent friend, ask what the hell Bucky thinks he's playing at. He's supposed to be an assassin and he can't shoot any better than this?

He really hopes it's Bucky in there, that it's just that Bucky can't bring himself to kill him, not that Bucky's playing with him, because--

***

He staggers as the ship sways under him, but he quickly regains his balance. His arm is still steady. His eye is steady, but his mission is still moving. His feet are now steady.

His mind...is not steady.

This is familiar.

( _stop_ )

It is the mission's fault.

( _God, fucking stop_ )

He breathes in.

***

\--the last shot comes just when he gives up bracing for it, but it's not the instant lights-out he'd feared. It's bad, though; it's _so_ bad, his legs turning to water and spilling him onto the grating before he can insert the last server blade they need. His body refuses point-blank to obey him when he tries to rise, and all he can do is stare down at the wet red stain spreading across his belly.

He has no idea what a gut shot will do to him, but he has to move. He has to. He has to try.

He's certain Bucky's going to shoot him in the head this time, but he only needs a few seconds. That's convenient, because a few seconds is all he has. He's not graceful at all as he scrabbles up the side of the server cabinet, hand shaking as he slides the last blade into place and immediately slumps.

"Charlie lock," he says thickly into his headset, relief a cold chill that rushes through him. It's also possible he's going into shock.

His vision greys out when the first volleys from the other two vessels hit the side of the helicarrier, shaking the entire ship. His guts clench around the ragged hole blown through them, and when he curls over himself, all he sees are stars. He has to get out of here--he has to get Bucky out of here before they kill each other in earnest--he just doesn't know how he's going to make it like this.

He gets up anyway, staggering along a catwalk that pitches and shakes beneath him. Another explosion rocks the ship, glass showering down from above as a giant metal strut shears free of its moorings. At first he can't even translate the howl that rises up from below, whether it's frustration or effort or agony, but that's Bucky down there, Bucky who's--

***

Pinned beneath a girder, the soldier struggles but can't get free. He can keep the beam from crushing him, but with one arm dislocated, he can't pry it off. He's trapped, like he is when they put him in the chair, but there's no chair and no cage of electrodes for his head, and he doesn't know if this is worse or better.

There's a thump, a clatter, and his mission is there. He is coming closer. He means to kill the soldier, and the soldier doesn't want to die in a trap. He struggles harder, but he doesn't have the leverage.

His mission kneels. Slides his hands under the beam. Lifts.

The soldier squirms free as fast as he can, his own stomach aching at the sounds his mission makes. He doesn't know why. It infuriates him, and the man keeps talking and won't stop, he's hit and he won't stop, and the soldier hits him again and again until he--

\-- _stops_. His fist hangs in midair.

He knows this man.

The floor cracks.

_Knows him_.

The man under him falls into empty air, dropping through fire and wreckage towards the sun-chased river far below while the soldier clings one-handed to the crippled ship. He's falling so fast. In seconds he'll be gone.

The soldier lets go and follows him down.

***

Even with Steve's healing, it's hard to get around at first. His leg heals up fine, but his shoulder's stiff for days, and he still gets twinges weeks later when he sits up or bends over too fast. Sam keeps telling him to take it easy, but he's not sure he has that luxury.

Bucky's still out there somewhere, and Steve can't be the only person looking for him. If finding him is a race, it's one Steve needs to win.

They find out too late that Bucky had visited the Smithsonian, but it's good to know that some of what Steve said on the helicarrier has stuck. Bucky at least knows who he is now, though it's anyone's guess whether Bucky believes it. He can't know where Bucky's head is, whether he'll think it's an elaborate ruse or even connect the photographs of himself at the museum with the man in the mirror.

Even with all of SHIELD's files uploaded to the internet, he has no idea where to start, wastes too many days digging through an electronic landfill before Natasha finally texts him an address.

The building's supposedly a dentist's office, but the place is deserted now. The sign on the front door reads: ‘Closed for Remodeling,' but Steve doubts it'll be reopening anytime soon. He can't spot any of the signs an official investigation would have left behind, but he's not too surprised the place has gone unnoticed. It's not part of Natasha's original file dump--he'd checked--so it must be one of Pierce's private sanctuaries.

"They've got guts, I'll give them that," Sam mutters as they make their way down surprisingly-wide stairs to the basement. "All these _secret lairs_ right in the middle of DC. My bank's like five blocks from here--but then, turns out my bank was a Hydra front too, so there's that."

"Small world," Steve agrees, smiling a little at Sam's disgruntled tone. "I'm more surprised they didn't blow the place up when they locked the doors behind them. Guess they were too busy getting themselves to cover to worry about what they were leaving behind."

"Hey, never complain about a lack of booby-traps," Sam chides. "And anyway, who wants to visit the dentist? I'd say they found the perfect place to hide--"

He's been waiting for a trap, for someone or something to spring at them out of the shadows, but this is worse. He doesn't turn the lights on--he's not sure how much of this he really wants to see--but his vision's good enough without. The basement is crammed with boxes that look like they've been stacked up in a hurry, but his eyes gravitate to the medical equipment jammed in wherever there's room: a couple of IV stands, monitors he doesn't know the use of though he's seen too many of them recently.

Right out in front is a chair like something out of a nightmare, though if you didn't look too close, if someone hauls it in fast, it might look like it belongs upstairs. Only no dentist he knows uses steel cuffs to lock his patients in, and he can't begin to fathom the metal halo that rises out of the back, the two curved plates with their inner faces lined with--are those electrodes?

Steve's gut twists when he gets it. It feels strangely appropriate. It might not be what he's thinking--maybe Hydra cells have a surplus of torture devices for every occasion--but he doesn't think he's wrong. This is something Bucky has experienced--he's sat there and they've _hurt_ him--and Steve wants nothing more in that moment than to smash it into a million tiny fragments.

"Steve," Sam says in that calm, quiet tone that always reaches him. Sam calls it his ‘guide voice,' and that makes just enough sense that Steve doesn't care that he's probably missing a reference. "You okay?"

He's really not, but he breathes through it and doesn't break anything. They don't know what any of it does, and they need to know. Problem is, he's all out of shadowy government agencies to pick this stuff apart for him.

He calls Stark instead.

" _Cap_ ," Tony says as he picks up the phone before Steve can even get a word out. " _I'm_ hurt. _You never call, you never write_ \--"

"I'm calling now," Steve cuts in. He knows that came out too harshly--he's supposed to be asking this man for a favor--but Tony takes him in stride.

" _And it's about time--I've had people in the area for days. Do you know what Stark People make in overtime_?" he asks. Steve can hear the capital letters. " _Neither do I. So what do you need? Extraction? Relocation? Sanctuary? --Exorcism_?" he throws out fast as Steve's drawing breath to explain.

Steve suddenly can't answer, because all of those options sound equally good.

"I need an expert," he says and doesn't realize it sounds like he's playing to Tony's ego until the words are already out.

Tony just laughs. He sounds pleased.

" _You've got one_ ," he promises. " _So, how do you feel about New York_?"

***

He doesn't remember everything at once. He doesn't even remember much at first. When he leaves the museum in which he finds his own picture--James Buchanan Barnes; intel confirmed--he takes a book from the souvenir shop on his way out. He reads it cover to cover as he waits for his body to heal, going to ground though retreating to an alternate base or safehouse would be more convenient. The massive contradiction his final mission presents leaves him too wary to return to handlers who might be compromised.

He collects what information he can, but he doesn't know what to do with what he finds. Steven Rogers. Captain America. Childhood friend--but he doesn't remember his childhood at all. He remembers waking on a table just as he is now, t-twen- _ty-sev--_

_Fuck_.

In the backroom of the long-abandoned auto shop he's found, he slides down the wall, both hands fisted in his hair. The museum, the three different books he's taken from three different locations, they all agree. He was born in 1917. The papers say it's 2014. He should be much older.

He should be _dead_.

He breathes in, out. It's strange to do this without a gun in his hand, but the breathing helps. He has to lock it down. Be the--soldier.

He lays his hands flat on the floor, crouched over his own knees, eyes wide. The sunlight that falls through age-grimed windows is yellowed and dim, but part of him gleams even in the shadows. One of his arms is flesh, the other metal. He's Hydra's soldier now. But Sergeant Barnes had fought Hydra. Sergeant Barnes did _not_ have a metal arm. Sergeant Barnes had--

Fallen. Blood. Snow.

He lifts his hands, turns them palm-up before him. His hands are shaking. This...this is...familiar.

His hands fist, but there's no scientist (Hydra) looming over him for him to kill.

He can change that.

He will.

***

"So," Tony calls out one morning, striding into the gym on Steve's floor waving a tablet around. "Who do we know in Switzerland? Because someone just took out an actually _hidden_ Hydra base and practically gift-wrapped the place for us, and I'm thinking we need to send a thank-you card. Fruit basket? Pepper says I should work on my manners. Well," he adds with a thoughtful frown, "they also killed everyone in the place--I think they stomped all the roaches too; this was some very thorough work--"

"What?" Steve says, catching the sandbag he's been taking out his frustrations on before it can swing back and hit him. "Let me see that."

"Yeah, this one was totally off the grid," Tony says as he hands the tablet over. "I suppose it could have been new--two heads are better or whatever--but forgive me if it sounds a little farfetched that some fresh-faced new recruit might have had a bone to pick." Tony shakes his head, chewing on the inside of his cheek as Steve scrolls rapidly through the reconnaissance report and a grim collection of photographs. "Whoever did that was _not_ a happy camper."

It's Bucky. He knows it is, because he knows how Bucky fights. The base had been well-hidden--a weather research station up in the mountains, supposedly--but that very remoteness had been used against them. The guards outside had fallen to sniper fire, but the agents inside had been mowed down with the unstoppable ease of a juggernaut. He can practically trace the exact path Bucky had taken through the base, heading right for the depths like he knew exactly where he was going. As to what he'd been looking for...that was less clear. He'd ripped his way into a panic room there at the end, but the records and equipment inside look untouched in the photos.

"Can we tell if anything's missing? How did you find out about this, anyway?"

"You know how it is. Start hiring former SHIELD operatives, and suddenly you've got fingers in everybody's pies."

Hill, then. Steve nods; he's not surprised she's still in the game.

"As for what's missing...I'm not sure our boy here really knows what he's looking for himself. This isn't the first one; he tore up a nice little country home outside Innsbruck just a couple of days before."

"And this country home...?"

Tony gives him a speculative look that Steve doesn't get until suddenly he does. Tony's waiting for some exclamation of shocked disapproval over the carnage--thinks it might be a possibility, at least--but this is Hydra. There's no such thing as a noncombatant, and Bucky wouldn't have gone in trying to negotiate.

Sometimes the Boy Scout image that follows Steve around really confuses the hell out of him. He's only here because he's a relic of a war. It hadn't exactly been craft projects and campfire songs.

"Listening post," Tony says, flashing a quick smile that doesn't quite smooth away his frown. "Recently, anyway. There's signs that they used to have much heavier equipment in the basement, but all that's been cleared out."

"Think he's going after the scientists?" It seems obvious enough to Steve, but he wouldn't mind a second opinion. When it comes to human interaction, Tony might as well have been raised by wolves, but he's smart. Steve respects that, even when he wants to strangle the man.

"Well," Tony drawls with a bright grin that doesn't quite reach his eyes, "I know if _I_ were kidnapped and forced to work for my captors, I'd want to kill every last one of them. But I've been told I'm not the best role model. Wait," Tony stops himself predictably, face screwing up in overdone bewilderment. "That's ridiculous--I'm an excellent role model!"

Steve knows better than to rise to the bait. "Any idea where he might go next?"

"See, that's the problem," Tony says, hunching a shoulder. "Every Hydra base I know about--which would be every Hydra base anyone with an internet connection knows about--has already been raided."

"Would Bucky know that?"

Tony's slow grin is deeply approving. "What do you know," he says, "with age _does_ come wisdom. I'll get a map started; you get ready to fly."

***

The next two installations he visits are empty, but not in response to anything he's done. What's left behind is too chaotic: a demolished server room that looks like it's been hit with a grenade or three, one case of attempted arson and the weeks-old stains left by three corpses he'd had nothing do to with. It looks like they've been discovered, and he kicks himself for not paying more attention to the news beyond confirming the date. He knows better. He's just been a little...distracted. Or far too single-minded. Hasn't he? Sometimes it's hard to get it straight.

In a small farm in eastern France, he finds signs of habitation. ( _Jackpot_.) Ever since the ( _war_ )...since the Resistance, Hydra has made a silent example of France, infiltrating every level of government. If there's a purge happening now, France will be the most likely to turn a blind eye.

He breaks the neck of the man patrolling the fences, greets the two guards stationed inside the front door with a knife. The small farmhouse seems quiet, but three guards are nothing, wouldn't be here alone.

"Are we packing this up?" someone asks, words muffled; it sounds like it comes from below.

"Just the tools," another man says, accompanied by the dull scrape of something heavy being dragged over concrete. "It's custom-calibrated; no good to anyone else. If they retrieve the asset, they'll put him on ice again. Plenty of time to build another."

Through a small door off the kitchen, he finds a set of stairs leading down. The basement is larger than the house that sits atop it, and it's...really damned familiar, though he's not sure why. Not until he sees the three missing guards packing surgical supplies into crates, two white-coated technicians fussing with more delicate tools--and the chair.

He shoots the guards one after another, but then he lowers his gun. The chair is here. The technicians are here. They're both older men, soft, who whip around at the first sound of gunfire then freeze in their tracks. One has leaned so far back into the table his palms are braced on that he's in danger of bending himself in half. The other stands tall, hands trembling, his thin throat working on a hard swallow.

He holsters his gun.

"Maintenance is required," he says, walking toward the chair. He does not hesitate. He sits without leaning back, left elbow propped at the optimal angle. He waits.

The tall man sighs out a shuddering breath. "Maintenance. Mother of God." He flexes his fingers and begins gathering his tools.

"Wh-what? Maintenance?" the stockier technician squeaks, edging cautiously along the sturdy steel table he's backed into. He has an American accent, vastly different from the other's measured vowels. "It just--it just shot--you're not seriously going to go near it!"

"If its conditioning has held, it will be of great benefit to Hydra to bring it in."

He watches the equipment being assembled on a small, wheeled cart: the tiny probes and drills, a jeweler's loupe, the welding torch.

"Held? _Held_? It just shot the fucking guards!"

"They were not its technicians," the tall man says with a disdainful sniff. "It knows they're disposable."

Something else goes on the crash cart that doesn't belong: a syringe.

He pulls the trigger before they realize he's drawn his gun; the tall man drops like a stone, the back of his skull painting the dingy wall behind him. The stocky one lets out a reedy scream but freezes when the gun swings towards him.

"I know what tools are required," he says quietly, staring the man down without blinking. "Are you capable of performing maintenance?"

"Yes!" the man bleats instantly. "I am! Please!"

"Proceed," he orders, watching the technician closely.

The loaded syringe is picked up and thrown aside, clattering under a shelf somewhere. This one's hands shake as he wheels the cart over, but the technician puffs deep breaths through his trembling lips even as fresh sweat breaks out on his brow. He forces his thick hands steady.

"Don't kill me," the technician pleads under his breath as he bends to open the arm's layered plating. "Please, God, don't kill me...."

His only warning is the furious grunt of effort from the stairwell. He brings up the gun hidden by his body, but it's too late: the disc spinning through the air slams into the remaining technician's neck, throwing the man sideways with an echoing crack.

He glares at the man standing braced and furious in the doorway, aims his gun steadily right between blue eyes. That's his--

That's.

Captain--

That's his captain.

Steve.

"You couldn't wait until he'd fixed my arm?" he grumbles, holstering his gun.

Steve slumps so sharply, he looks in danger of falling over. That...that is definitely not familiar. He frowns, eyeing his captain sidelong.

"Bucky," Steve says on a long breath. He sounds...relieved?

He--Bucky?--shakes his head slowly. "I honestly got no clue."

Steve laughs. It sounds like it hurts him, which makes no sense at all. "We'll figure it out," Steve says, voice choked. "I promise."

He remembers promises from before, but Steve doesn't say it the same way. He--Bucky--waits. It's the thing to do when he doesn't understand: just keep waiting and try to figure it out if he can. If he pretends he isn't confused, sometimes they pass him by, let him be. Sometimes he can unravel the tangle of strange new things he finds himself in before they can decide to train the knowledge into him. There's so much silence in his head (his mind is steady), but he thinks...he thinks letting his captain figure him out might not be so bad.

He nods.

His captain smiles, lopsided and a little broken. His eyes are warm, but they shine too bright. "Let's get you home," Steve says with a catch in his voice.

He doesn't know where that is, but he rises, willing to find out.

***

Steve can't remember ever being as afraid as he'd been when he crept down those basement steps and saw Bucky sitting in that torture device, a lab-coated scientist leaning over him with tools close at hand. Even if he'd been looking for it, he wouldn't have been able to spot the gun from the way Bucky was sitting. It'd looked like he'd gone willingly, like they'd caught him again or his programming had reasserted itself, and Steve had flung the shield to take out the threat before his body knew it was moving. Having Bucky bitch at him for it had been so startlingly normal, it'd felt like the world had righted itself all at once.

It had only taken the sound of Bucky's name to remind him that things were never that simple.

"So, this is the man of the hour?" Sam asks when they come up from below. Sam's smiling, but Steve can tell he's got a few things to say about running ahead of your backup. It's just...when he'd heard those gunshots, he hadn't been able to wait.

Bucky says nothing, eyeing Sam with the same level stare he'd met Steve with on the helicarrier. It makes the skin on the back of his neck creep, but at this range Steve can tell there's no anger in it. Bucky's just watching. Observing.

"Yeah," Steve says, leaping into the silence before it can get awkward. More awkward. "Sam, this is Bucky. Bucky, Sam."

"Heard a lot about you," Sam says easily; he doesn't hold out his hand, but his friendly nod makes that okay. "Glad to see you're in one piece."

Bucky's brows draw together minutely like Sam's started speaking another language, but he doesn't seem to have anything to say. Steve wonders whether that glimpse he'd caught of the old Bucky was a fluke, something that comes and goes, and tries to swallow down the emptiness that lodges behind his sternum. Bucky's alive, and that's what matters.

"Listen," Steve jumps in again, "we should get out of here before anyone else shows up--"

Bucky shakes his head. "Relocation orders." His quiet voice is unmoved. "Travel undetected, destroy the evidence if discovered, leave no one for questioning. Hydra doesn't wait for the weak."

Sam frowns. "So you're saying they were on their own." It's not a question; Bucky doesn't answer it. "Well, since it looks like we've got the time, should we strip this place? Is there anything worth taking back with us?"

Steve's ashamed to admit he hasn't even looked. His main concern was getting Bucky out of there.

"The tools," Bucky replies, nodding at his arm. "For maintenance."

"Are you all right?" Steve asks, reaching for Bucky's elbow though he doesn't quite dare to connect. Down in the basement, he'd foolishly come at Bucky with his arms out to gather him into a hug, but he hadn't made it two steps before Bucky's wary freeze had stopped him in his tracks.

Glancing down, Bucky turns his metal hand palm-up and flexes his fingers into a fist and back again. Something grates and clicks inside the forearm, the pneumatic hum Steve's already learned to associate with effort a soft counterpoint to Bucky's movements, and the elbow joint whines faintly when he drops his hand. "Dings and scratches," Bucky decides, and there it is again, that hint that past and present are colliding. They're Bucky's words, but they've been stripped of Bucky's accent, his cocksure drawl and his energy.

Steve nods, already planning a call to Stark. "We'll get you fixed up, don't worry."

Bucky heads back down into the basement with them with no sign of hesitation. He seems remarkably unfazed until he walks right up to the chair, reaches up with his metal hand, and snaps off at the hinge one of the plates meant to cage his head. That gets tossed aside so the other plate can receive the same treatment, and then he steps back. The line of his shoulders is unbearably tense, his hands curling into fists.

Sam reaches for Steve's arm in the instant Bucky moves, but it's only to hold him back. From the corner of his eye, he sees Sam shake his head, warning him not to interfere. He wouldn't have. Bucky's only doing what Steve had wanted to back in DC, and Bucky deserves it infinitely more.

The chair's left arm shears off as Bucky slams his boot against the leather padding. The right arm goes next, ripped off with both hands as the bolts that fix the heavy base to the concrete floor squeal a warning. The padded back is flung away haphazardly, spinning across the floor until it fetches up with a dull slap in a tangle of bodies: three guards sprawled amidst fallen boxes spilling packs of gauze and surgical gloves.

Bucky doesn't stop until he's dismantled the chair down to the bare bones of its metal frame, and even then he doesn't look satisfied. He's breathing hard, but it's the rapid, angry kind Steve remembers from when he'd drag Bucky _away_ from a fight, usually started because someone had said the wrong thing about Steve himself in Bucky's hearing. He hasn't even broken a sweat.

"Bucky?" Steve asks after a fast glance at Sam, who doesn't seem surprised. He's probably seen this sort of thing before, though PTSD likely doesn't scratch the surface of what Bucky's going through.

Bucky whips around too fast, like he's forgotten they're there, gun out and aimed at Steve's head again. Sam coils tight beside him, itching to move, but Steve stays put, his arms relaxed at his sides. It's worked before, even when he'd looked much more threatening at the time.

Bucky's eyes catch Steve's and lock, the hot rage banking in his eyes until only the watchfulness remains. He straightens from his ready stance and takes a slow breath, shoulders easing as he holsters his gun. It's mind-boggling how quickly he masters himself, but it's heartbreaking as well. Bucky's always been the level-headed one, but this is something else.

It's pure impulse that makes him offer, or maybe even the skeleton of that nightmare chair is too much for him to look at. Holding out the shield, Steve asks, "Need some leverage on those bolts?"

Bucky's face blanks entirely, eyes dropping fast to the shield before lifting to search Steve's face.

"You gotta learn to keep hold of that thing," Bucky says without inflection, soft voice scratchy with disuse.

Sam snorts on his left, saying, "Man's got a point."

Steve's a little too busy grinning to defend himself.

***

He's had his own extraction planned from the moment he crossed the border, has his next few targets all lined up, but that's scrapped with the arrival of his captain. Steve wants to return to the US, has a private jet fueled and waiting. He doesn't argue. He follows.

His captain insists on sitting beside him, while the other soldier--Wilson--waits until they're airborne to rise and linger in the aisle, watching them both and leaning his arm on the nearest seat back. Wilson eyes him like a possible hostile. It's not important, except that it _is_.

The last time they'd met, Wilson had had wings. Bucky--he decides the name is an order; it makes it easier to remember--finds he doesn't blame Wilson for his caution.

"--weren't sure we'd catch up with you," his captain is saying, eyes fixed on Bucky's face. Steve looks like he wants to devour him, but Bucky finds it strangely comforting. (This does not make sense. It's not Pierce's look or Rumlow's or Zola's, but attracting too much attention is never a positive thing.) "Everything SHIELD had on Hydra got made public a few weeks ago, so we figured our best chance was to somehow get ahead of you. Didn't think there'd be much left behind to hold your attention after all the raids."

Bucky nods. That explains the previous two bases. Still.

"Everything? Including me?" he asks, torn between uneasiness at the possibility of exposure and a burning hunger to _know_. He remembers Hydra's methods all too clearly, but they don't tell him anything. He knows he can survive both freezing and thawing, the sizzling snap of electricity and enough physical punishment to kill a normal man. What he doesn't know is how far down their training goes. He doesn't know if Zola picked him for a reason or if he was just convenient.

"No--not with the data that was made public," Steve says. "But a friend managed to get me a hardcopy of your file. It's back in New York, if you want to read it."

"Yes," he says too forcefully and stills, waiting for reprisal. He can bark orders at the mercenaries they hand out like ammunition, but his superiors have always demanded respect.

His captain's expression shifts from sympathy to concern. "It's okay," Steve says quickly. He sounds like he means it. "I get it. You...said you weren't sure who you are?"

Wilson shifts uncertainly at that but stays where he is. His eyes are watchful but encouraging.

"I don't remember being Barnes," Bucky admits. "Just falling." Blood and snow. "And you, but not _you_. I just...I _know_ you," he insists through a grimace, frustrated at not being able to put it into words. His right hand tightens into a fist on his knee. "Like how to walk. You're just...there. In my head. Like you've always been."

"How much do you remember?" Wilson asks carefully.

Judging from their expressions as he tries to explain, it's not much.

Halfway through, his captain reaches out again and grips his forearm. Steve sits to his left, between him and the aisle, but he's not afraid of the metal braced between them. He doesn't seem to want anything, either; there's no tug to instruct Bucky where to go, how to hold himself for inspection or correction. It's as if contact alone is his entire goal.

It's so familiar Bucky wants to reach back, settle his right hand over his captain's and hold on tight, but that's a liberty no one would stand for.

A helicopter takes them from the airstrip to their destination, bypassing customs and the early morning traffic altogether. The sky's still dark when they arrive, dawn an hour off, and only one man waits for them on the roof when they come in for a landing.

"Rogers, Wilson," the stranger shouts over the dying thump of the helicopter's blades, lifting both arms and flexing his hands as if asking to be given something. He's of average height, dark-haired, his watchful eyes lit reluctantly by an enormous smile. The entire world swims around that not-quite-familiar face. "Good to have you back!"

"Tony," Steve replies with a lopsided smile.

"And this must be Sergeant Barnes," Tony adds, dropping his arms though his hands remain empty. He strolls closer without hesitation, the corners of his eyes crinkling as his grin curls up at the edges. "Cap here tells me you've been making time with other mechanics."

"Tony," Steve warns as Bucky stares. Does he mean...?

"Look," Tony says, reaching out like he means to drape his arm around Bucky's human shoulder. He doesn't, but Bucky's so startled that he obeys the unspoken order (" _Right this way, Sergeant, and let me show you the finest in_ \--") and keeps walking, falling into step with Tony as he leads them towards the roof access. "I know everyone says I have a problem with commitment, but I think it's time we make it official. Agree to stop seeing other people. Especially if you're going to be living in Avengers Tower. You go running off to Hydra for repairs," Tony huffs, "and they're going to say the great Tony Stark can't perform. I've got a reputation to think of!"

"It's true," Wilson drawls at Bucky's back. "Man's got a reputation."

" _Thank_ you," Tony says as Steve groans into his hand.

Bucky shakes his head. "What?"

Stark?

"You wanted maintenance, right? Well, it just so happens I give the best maintenance in town. But it's gotta be exclusive, and you need to use your safeword before you try putting me through a wall. The rest we can negotiate."

"Maintenance," Bucky echoes helplessly. It's the only word Tony's said of which he's sure of the meaning. "You're a technician?" He has the arrogance for it, at least.

Tony makes a face like he tastes something bad. "Me? No. Nonono. I'm more of a genius. And an inventor. In fact, if you ever get tired of that old model," he says, jerking his chin at Bucky's arm, "I could build you an upgrade. Better, stronger, faster--we're talking the finest in Stark technology."

"Is it gonna blow up?" spills out of Bucky's mouth before he can even think, instinctive as ducking a bullet. Steve makes a choked sound on his left, somewhere between hurt and hilarity, but Stark's smile only twists for the barest of seconds.

"Let's just say I've been working on improving the family average. So?"

He looks at Steve, but his captain's too busy giving Tony a look of despairing frustration to protest this proposed alteration to the hardware. He's received regular upgrades over the years, but he suspects Tony is not approved to make those kinds of adjustments. He suspects Tony is different.

He is...the arm is...he doesn't want it. But he needs it.

Steve rallies before Bucky has to guess his way through the minefield of replying, not sure which answer will merit correction. "Maybe we should start with the maintenance, Stark."

"Oh, come on--we're making it official!" Tony says as he throws open the roof access door. "That means I get to delete the ex's photos and throw all their crap out on the lawn. We are making it official, right, Barnes? Explicit consent would make me feel a whole lot better about playing doctor with you."

" _Tony_ ," Steve says again, his voice sharper this time.

Bucky thinks he understands. Tony is willing to fix his arm, but he wants an assurance that he won't be harmed. It's not a concern. His captain brought him here (and why would he try to hurt Howard?), and Stark isn't Hydra. Bucky has enough control for anything if he remembers these two things.

"Yes," Bucky says, glancing at Steve to make sure he's guessed correctly. It's the first time he can remember being consulted about his upkeep, and he wants to get it right.

"Fantastic," Tony says, clapping his hands together and instantly cringing when Bucky twitches. "I mean great! JARVIS! Prep all the things!"

He keeps waiting for the flash of memory to sear through him as Tony hustles the three of them into a glass and steel lab glowing under brilliant spot lighting. Snow and blood, the scientist and the saw--but Tony walks right past the reinforced tables, the arrays of drills and cutting torches and machinery Bucky can only guess at, until they fetch up in a screened-off area in the back. Behind the screen there's nothing but two wheeled stools, a folding table weighed down with tools and a black leather couch. Bucky only realizes how much tension has gathered in his shoulders when the rest of the lab disappears from view.

"All right," Tony says, waving at them imperiously. "You two--out of the way," he says to Steve and Wilson, tipping his head toward the couch. Steve shoots Bucky an encouraging look. He's not leaving. That's...good. "And you--have a seat, Barnes, and show me what you've got."

Bucky sits where he's told, props his arm on a table that shifts a bit until he finds a position he can maintain. There are no straps, no bands, no cuffs. No chair. Stark's ordering someone unseen to begin scanning, glancing constantly at an image that lights up in midair over the table. It looks like a schematic of Bucky's arm. From the couch, Steve makes a curious noise, leaning in closer for a better look, but most of Bucky's attention is on Tony.

Stark is still talking as he leans in close, long-fingered hands moving delicately over Bucky's arm until he finds the release mechanisms for the plating. One catch is triggered with a snap and a hiss. Tony pauses, face half a foot away from the reinforced joint of Bucky's elbow. His voice is a constant drone, too close, as Bucky breathes in.

Breathes out.

_Stops_ before the shiver gathering in his spine can release with a thrown punch, a drawn weapon.

"So far so good," Tony says as he triggers the second catch and finesses part of the layered plating away from the inner components of Bucky's arm. "Just going to set this aside and get a better look at what we're dealing with. Looks like...oh yeah, got a cracked servo here--you need better shock absorption, by the way--and just going to turn...your wrist like so--"

Forewarned, he allows the readjustment. He watches Stark, who keeps his eyes down, intent on his work, broadcasting every thought aloud before he acts upon it. A fine sheen of sweat gathers at Stark's hairline. He allows no other sign of nervousness, and as the minutes pass, even that tell disappears as curiosity takes over. Sometimes he yells at a small collection of robots but never at Bucky. It's...interesting.

When Bucky glances over, his captain smiles encouragingly.

He doesn't understand the warmth that spreads behind his ribs, but it's his, and he's keeping it.

***

Steve takes Bucky back to the floor Stark set up for him when Tony's done. Sam has been staying with him until now, isn't pleased by the idea of leaving Steve alone with Bucky, but Steve's the one Bucky knows, and it's clear Bucky's not ready to deal with unfamiliar things. His reaction to Tony had been cautious enough, and out of the suit, Tony doesn't exactly scream danger. Sam knows how to handle things like soldiers on shaky mental ground, but he's not equipped to handle a superpowered breakdown, and Steve wants him out of the line of fire.

And maybe he selfishly wants Bucky all to himself for just a little while--just until the disbelief wears off and it starts feeling real to him.

Bucky's alive. Knows him, even if only subconsciously. Trusts him enough to come here, into someone else's territory on someone else's terms. That's huge, and Steve doesn't intend to take it for granted or screw it up.

"Are you hungry?" he asks as he heads for the kitchen, turning lights on as he goes. He's starving; there'd been food on the jet, but he hadn't thought to eat, too stunned to have Bucky by his side once more to even realize he was hungry.

He looks back at the silence that follows and finds Bucky watching him, not far from the door. "I'm not going back under," Bucky says, and it's not a question. It's maybe a warning, but his voice is so flat, so quiet, it's hard to tell. "No cryo."

"No," Steve says fast, a little too loudly as horror rises up. "God, no. We wouldn't _do_ that, Buck. It's never going to happen to you again."

Bucky doesn't react for a long moment, but then he nods. "I can eat."

Steve wishes like hell that he could take that as a joke, but it's just information, calmly delivered. Bucky doesn't have to worry about his last meal getting frozen along with him, so Bucky can eat. Steve has to clench his hands on the floating counter a moment as he finds himself wondering how often that hadn't been the case.

"Good," he says when he can get his voice to work. "Give me a moment, and I'll whip up some of your old favorites. Uh, unless those have changed?" Between the Depression and army fare, there hadn't been much variety in their diets back in the day; they'd been so grateful for what they had, they'd have eaten anything set in front of them. That didn't mean they'd liked it; Steve still can't smell cabbage without his stomach rolling over.

Even a laundry list of complaints would be better than the flicker in Bucky's eyes, there and gone in an instant, like he can't even translate that question into English. Steve has to force a smile and busy himself with rummaging through counters to regain his calm.

He doesn't hear Bucky move--even in heavy boots and body armor, his footsteps are silent--but there's a faint creak from the hard-backed chair by the door as Bucky sits down. He's so far away, Steve wants to coax him over to one of the bar stools at the island counter--wants him no further than arm's reach and doesn't care that it's stupid--but he knows why Bucky chose it. It's close to an exit without being too close, gives him a good line of sight on the apartment's other doors while keeping him far away from the enormous windows that make up one wall. It's in shadow while the rest of the apartment is bathed in light.

Glancing over his shoulder, he finds Bucky sitting loose-limbed but alert, wearing the same watchful expression he's had since France. There's something far too patient about it to be distrust, but Steve can't quite place the emotion behind it. It's like--

"You look like you're waiting for something," he says as his brain does a strange mental shift, stops looking for emotion and starts looking for motive.

Bucky frowns like he's puzzled Steve would even ask, but he answers with nod.

"Can I ask what for?" God, don't let it be a signal, a trigger--

Bucky gives him the look of an alley cat that knew all along the food was a trap, but he answers anyway. "Things to make sense."

Bucky goes back to looking puzzled when Steve finds himself gripping the edge of the counter once more, wanting to break the neck of that Hydra scientist and every other one like him all over again.

***

The place his captain brings him to has an open, airy floorplan, not very defensible but easily monitored. He doesn't like the windows--too easy to spot a target through, though glass gets trickier every time he wakes--even if the view of the streets below must be strategically superior. From where Bucky sits, he can see the entire common area, blocked off from the kitchen by a long counter lined on one side with tall metal stools. There's a dining table right in front of that unsettling wall of floor-to-ceiling glass which he looks away from uneasily. The elevator is on his right, and he can watch both of the hallways that lead away to hidden areas without turning his head. And he can see Steve.

His captain moves with purpose, fetching and filling a pot, choosing a knife from the block on the counter and pulling things from the refrigerator to line them up beside him. His hands are confident as he chops and stirs, and soon the air smells of soup cooking, far better than anything either of them could have managed, but--

(She?)

\--didn't have to do that, the old lady down the hall. He's always liked fixing things, and a sweet smile plus a thank you in that paper-thin voice is more than enough. She doesn't have to feed them; she doesn't have much herself, and it's not like her kids are around to help, not like they should be. But he understands pride, because he lives with Steve, doesn't he? So he's going to thank her next time he sees her, see if he can scrounge up some wildflowers from a park or a yard somewhere when he returns her pot after giving it a wash. And he's going to eat whatever she's given them, because if he doesn't, Steve won't either, so he--

\--blinks his eyes back into focus on a cold burst of adrenaline, because his sense of what he sees is just gone, like his eyes were turned off, awareness erased by memory. And there's a presence, a person, too close--he jerks, about to bring up both legs and slam them out straight, thrust the threat far away from him, but it's only his captain. Steve crouches in front of him, placing himself lower than Bucky, in a weaker position, only Bucky knows damn well that neither of those things has ever been true.

"Bucky?" Steve asks, eyes wide and worried. "You okay?"

He's not supposed to touch. He can take what they hand him, but they don't trust him and he can't say he wants to get too close to them either. It surprises him as much as it does his captain when he reaches out, his right hand headed for Steve's cheek for no other reason than because it's there.

Steve catches his hand but doesn't shove it away. He curls his left hand around the back of Bucky's right and holds it to his face like it belongs there. "Bucky?"

"Just...wondering when you learned to cook," he says, not sure where the words are coming from, but they feel right.

Steve grins hugely, squeezing his hand more tightly. "What did I say about complaining when it's my turn?"

Bucky shakes head minutely. He doesn't remember that. It dims Steve's smile, but he still looks...hopeful?

"Well, that's the thing. You never did. Always said your ma didn't raise no dummies."

His ma. Mother. Before the books he stole, it would have sounded like a trick. He woke up on a table one day, fully adult, knowing some things but not others. That was his birth and beginning, at first. "I don't remember her," he admits.

"Do you want me to tell you about her?" Steve asks with a lopsided smile. The very edge of it curls against his palm. "Dinner's got a while to cook."

Bucky nods. It seems like something he should know, even if there's no particular urgency behind it. The scientists, Steve--these are things he knows, his feelings about them as deeply ingrained as his knowledge of how to field strip a rifle. Nothing else has the same impact.

Steve looks around as if trying to spot a handy chair, but he doesn't let go of Bucky's hand. When he rises he tugs Bucky up by it instead, waiting only long enough to see if Bucky will protest before tipping his head towards the couch. "C'mon," he says with an easy smile. It's not an order; Bucky just doesn't feel strongly enough about those ridiculous windows to object. "I mean--if you're not comfortable, there's other rooms...."

It takes his captain's uncertain look to realize he's frowning. "I leaned on you," he says out of the blue. Steve sucks in a sharp breath, clutching at Bucky's hand. "Until I could walk."

"Yeah," Steve says, swallowing hard. "Sorry I was late this time."

Late? "I wasn't expecting anyone."

"Well, I hope I'm a pleasant surprise."

Steve looks like he does when he's taken a hit--Bucky _knows_ \--but they're not fighting. It doesn't make sense, and he should wait, watch, try to make sense of things so they don't have to teach him, because he keeps so much more that way. Admitting he doesn't know is _not safe_ , but he can't just watch this. When Steve tries to let him go, Bucky turns his wrist fast, catches Steve's hand and holds on tight. Steve obviously likes that or he wouldn't have done it in the first place, wouldn't let Bucky be doing this now. It's so much better than a shoulder he doesn't require, not necessary but vital.

"Yes," he says as Steve stares, not trying to get away. Steve is a _good_ surprise, and Bucky hates surprises.

Steve's sudden, swift grin lights up the whole room, even when he ducks his head, cheeks going faintly red. "Okay," he says with a strangled laugh. "Good. Let's...I'll tell you about your ma."

Bucky would much rather hear about Steve, but he isn't (supposed to be) picky. Listening to Steve's voice is enough.

***

For the entire first week, Steve thinks Bucky's going to be another Natasha, and he wishes like anything she'd come home already, or Clint even, because he needs someone to translate the blank wall of Bucky's expressionless stare. He manages to figure out a few things, but it's mostly through Bucky's actions, not his face.

Like how Bucky will eat anything Steve puts in front of him but prefers what's unironically known these days as Southern cuisine: huge breakfasts, fry-ups, the kind of meals that leave you half-comatose on the couch for hours. He just can't be talked into them unless Steve makes loud and obvious plans that amount to a full day at home. It's not that Bucky thinks they're going to freeze him before his body's primed to handle it; he's just unsettled by the possibility of having to fight on a full stomach, considers every moment he spends unoccupied an excuse for someone to throw a mission his way.

He likes long showers hot enough to leave his skin a slightly-boiled pink, evidently likes the length of his hair. Steve's left scissors out for Bucky along with safety razors and shaving cream, but while Bucky uses the latter two sporadically, he leaves his hair the way it is, only occasionally pulling it back out of his eyes.

He likes Tony better than Sam, proving there's no accounting for taste, but Pepper wakes something in him that neither the Russians nor Hydra nor any amount of torture could suppress for long, namely the gentleman that's always lurked beneath his charm. The first time she walks in the room, Bucky takes one look at her and jolts to his feet, refusing to sit down again until she walks out with a smile. Tony warns him not to try anything and earns himself a look of such incredulous disdain, it's like the clock has turned back seventy years: Bucky handing Lisa Goss into a cab outside the dancehall instead of angling to walk her home, because Lisa ain't a dame, she's a _lady_.

Bucky _loves_ the gym. Steve expects him to wreck the place at first, taking out his frustrations on things he can safely hit, but he doesn't need Sam to tell him he's projecting. Bucky's in perfect command of his body, knows his own strength down to the smallest iota, and like any good sniper, it's not destruction that drives him. It's precision, and Bucky's content to spend hours with the weights, on the treadmill, landing jabs with his fists and feet on a sandbag while Steve gets distracted from his own workout. As still as Bucky is the rest of the time, in the gym he comes alive, and it takes Steve a little too long to realize it's because this is the one place he's always been allowed to move, as much as he likes.

"Want to spar?" he asks one day and for an instant he's done it: cracked Bucky's patient mask to let out bewilderment, surprise, something sharp he hopes is excitement and not fear.

He's wrong, though: Bucky's nothing like Natasha, and once he gives up on the idea of faking his way through a life he doesn't quite know what to do with, he turns so expressive it hurts sometimes to see it, his face displaying every thought like the billboards in Times Square.

***

The rifle Bucky's holding is an old friend. It ought to be; he's carried her through rain and forest, snow and mountain, all through the war, the war he never finished. He's in his blue coat but his hair is long, and he has to fold his left hand carefully so that metal doesn't click against metal where sharp ears might hear.

He's lying on a roof in a green country, and the people below are speaking a language he ought to understand in a thick accent that (feels like home) confuses him. He doesn't need to understand. Listening is not required. He has no specific targets, only a number: six will be adequate to start. Someone asked him earlier if he can count.

The occasional pop and stutter of gunfire echoes to him from all across the city. Sometimes there are long pauses, but it always starts up again. The civilians below are scared: of the gunfire, the swaggering men in their combat gear, every car that passes. A small patrol of four men approach a pair of women who edge closer together. A young boy walks between the pair, one hand held in each woman's grasp, stumbling as he steps on their toes.

He needs four more to make his quota, and there are seven targets below to choose from. He breathes in--

\--and he's screaming as he wakes, throat tearing as the sound is ripped from him. He's not on a roof and there's no gun in his hands, but now he's tangled, trapped, in a dim room he doesn't know as the door crashes in and someone's shouting--

(" _Report, Soldier! Stand down!_ ")

\--as the lights come on, too bright, round white spots that blind him as they cut parts of him away--

" _Bucky_!"

\--but he's strong now, he's fast, and as a hand makes glancing contact with his human shoulder, he rips through the weak restraints holding him down, throws himself onto his attacker and rolls them furiously until he's on top. Pinning the intruder down, he cocks his metal fist back, gathering the force he needs to shatter bone and eliminate the threat.

"Bucky, _wait_!"

The blue eyes staring up at him are wide with fear in a face crumpled with concern. He knows that look, from a base, a battlefield, a train ( _falling_ ). He knows this man, but the name is momentarily lost in a brief struggle between panic at the correction sure to follow ( _stand down, stand down, or it's the chair the freezer the saw_ ) and the intense desire to kill every last sonofabitch who's ever punished him for fighting back. Only Steve (it's Steve, thank _God_ ) isn't yelling or giving orders. He's just trying to get Bucky's attention.

"--all right, you're all right, Buck, it's just me. I'm sorry I burst in like that, just...come on back to me, Bucky, please, it was just a--"

"'M listening," he manages as he lowers his fist, loosening the tight grip he has on Steve's thin undershirt. It's half a lie. Steve's voice drones in his ears, but the words just pass him by. Uncurling the fingers of his right hand, he spreads them wide, thumb brushing the line of Steve's collarbone as his fingers curve over sturdy muscle, the rise of a firm pectoral warm against his palm. Steve's chest rises and falls rapidly, and Bucky sits back enough to watch it move. This is important. "You couldn't breathe," he says at last. The realization unsettles him, but he somehow knows it wasn't his fault.

Steve laughs; he looks so happy. Even to Bucky, that's an odd response. "I was sick a lot when we were kids. Was that what you were dreaming about?"

The images from his...nightmare? are all but lost in the terror and confusion of waking, but when he thinks back, he shakes head. "Belfast." He's not sure why the dream--memory--bothers him. It was just a mission like a hundred others.

Steve doesn't ask. He lies quietly under Bucky, wrists flat to the floor, palms up, though Bucky isn't holding them there. The fear's already gone from his eyes, but Steve is (an idiot) his superior (and an idiot), and Bucky's not supposed to lay hands on him.

But he wants to; he _wants_ , as familiar as his guns and Steve's voice calling him back.

"Bucky?"

He should get up. He should have let Steve up the minute he came back to himself. He shouldn't be curling his fingers into Steve's shirt again, like he intends to keep him here.

"Buck? Do you--want me to stay?"

He shouldn't. He shouldn't. They won't like it.

That reason alone is enough to make him nod.

"Stay," he echoes, and Steve smiles. It's that easy, like it's been that easy all along.

***

Steve wakes to a scene right out of their childhood: Bucky hogging every bit of space he can steal, arms and legs flung every which way. Bucky had rolled over at some point to face him, and now one of his knees is digging into Steve's thigh, his heavy left arm thrown across Steve's ribs. The metal has warmed to body temperature, and Steve doesn't really notice the weight, but it's hard and unforgiving, strange enough it really should have woke him up before this.

The face turned into the pillows is more familiar than his own, even half-hidden by Bucky's hair. The line of his mouth is softened by sleep, plush lower lip tucked in a little as if biting back something he doesn't want discovered. There's a faint crease between his brows, but the skin around his eyes no longer has the bruised look he arrived with, and his closed lids flicker slowly. He almost looks peaceful.

Steve wants to stay right where he is, but it wouldn't be right. Bucky trusts him, and staring at your best friend while he's sleeping isn't the best way to repay that. Moving slowly, he pushes himself up to sit back against the headboard, ready to explain why he's here when Bucky inevitably wakes if Bucky doesn't recall. Only Bucky doesn't stir at all, and Steve spends a useless minute or five wondering whether Bucky's a sounder sleeper than Steve ever realized or if it's down to that trust he doesn't want to lose.

He really should get up. And he will, but--there's a tablet on the nightstand that he'd left behind a day or two ago, showing Bucky how to look things up on the internet. Bucky can fly a state of the art jet but can't navigate cat videos on YouTube, and even Steve agrees that this is a crime. So he'd left the tablet behind for Bucky to play with--or break; Tony doesn't care, because _cat videos_ \--but there's a drawing program on it and a stylus tucked in the case, and he just....

It's been so long, and he still can't draw Bucky the way he wants to, because he doesn't have that right. He can barely believe that he has the chance after all this time, that Steve's made an offer yet again that got them off the floor, sharing a bed. The light's as bad as ever, but that's because the blinds are closed, the white light from the tablet screen casting weird shadows over them both. It's everything and nothing like a day he remembers from long ago, and he just _has_ to; it's a moral imperative.

It's probably the faint ticking of the stylus against the screen that wakes Bucky up. One blue eye peels open, rolling up to fix Steve with a flat look as the metal arm slung across Steve's thighs shifts then stills. The interlocking plates catch on and tug at the sleeve of the black tee Bucky wore to bed, pulling the material tighter still across the broad line of his shoulders.

"What," Bucky says without lifting his head from the pillow. Steve shouldn't be so happy to realize Bucky's still not a morning person, but the continuity is comforting.

"Nothing," Steve says, trying not to grin. He shouldn't--it won't be the same, and he's just setting himself up for disappointment--but he turns the tablet so Bucky can see it anyway.

The Bucky on the screen has the bed to himself, but he's still overflowing it like an octopus, cheeks mashed plump, hair a dark mop someone should be using to knock down cobwebs. In the bottom right corner there's a tiny cartoon of a narrow-eyed lynx with fluffed-up fur, three oversized paws and one metal leg, crouched aggressively over a short stack of pancakes.

Bucky just stares, and Steve instantly feels terrible. Bucky's barely past watching them like it's the only thing standing between him and shock treatment--how's he supposed to understand being teased?

Steve yelps when Bucky's left hand reaches up and closes on his shirt, hauling him sideways and down with a jerk. Bucky's heaving himself upright at the same time, and Steve winds up with his face planted in Bucky's chest, one hand braced on the pillows and the other on Bucky's hip, as Bucky digs the knuckles of his right hand into Steve's hair and makes an ungodly mess of it.

They burst out laughing at the same time, and if Steve's is a shade hysterical, Bucky's helplessly confused, it only makes them laugh harder. "What the hell are we laughing at?" Bucky asks as he tries and fails to catch his breath. Steve can only shake his head, still leaning against Bucky with the tablet going to sleep between them, its harsh, white light flickering out.

***

Steve is twitchy with a pencil in hand, and that makes Bucky twitchy too, at first. It's all fast glances and looking away, a lower lip caught between white, even teeth and aborted movements that don't go anywhere. It drives Bucky crazy, and even though it's damned familiar, it's not a piece of the past he wants to have back. Steve shouldn't look nervous, not of _him_ , even if Bucky deserves it.

On the day he figures it out, he's standing just to the side of those hated windows in the common area. They're bulletproof, shatterproof, mirrored on the outside, and he still can't stand them. There are many things he dislikes about the future he's in, but he knows he needs to face them, so he tries. He's still not going to silhouette himself right out in the middle of all that glass, but he can turn off all the lights--not like they need them in the middle of the day--and stand just to the side, looking out.

The view's amazing, just like he'd thought it would be, but soon enough his eyes sharpen on a reflection in the glass. It's faint, only visible because the sky outside is filled with lowering storm clouds, but he sees Steve look up from where he's sitting on the couch, stare for a long minute then drop his head to the sketchbook propped up on his knees. Steve's a skilled draftsman, but this time he's scribbling away like he has to capture what he sees before someone makes him stop. It could just be the view from the window, but Bucky doesn't think so. The window's always there; Bucky's the only factor that matches up with Steve's more furtive spells.

"You can draw me if you want," Bucky says to the glass, watching Steve's reflection jerk upright. "I don't mind."

"Are you sure?" Steve asks after a moment.

Bucky's used to being stared at, evaluated. Usually they make him stand for photographs ( _quarter turn, stop, quarter turn_ ), but he once sat for hours while someone drew a circuit diagram after he was moved to a new location. The language changed too, that time; it feels like it was a long time ago.

_Don't tell him that,_ warns a voice inside, one he's learning to listen to. That voice can make things unpleasant for him if he ignores it; it's best to follow orders.

"Yeah." He's still not getting the inflection right, but the half-shrug and the glance over his shoulder goes over well. "Why not?"

Steve doesn't tell him to sit or stand a certain way. The real surprise is that Bucky doesn't expect him to. Steve just drops his head again and starts sketching, slower this time. He still looks like it's a secret, something he's getting away with, and that's...wrong.

Bucky waits for Steve to flip the page before leaving the window. He goes to sit on the other side of the couch, staring until Steve looks up and meets his eyes. _It's all right_ , he tries to say, but the words won't come. It's all right, any damn thing Steve wants, the way it always has been. He really doesn't mind; Steve only wants such simple, painless things.

Steve's smile is a little hesitant, a little...apologetic? But it's real. It's Bucky's. He's keeping it. No one's taking this from him again.

***

Steve's spent so long resisting the urge to draw his best friend, he doesn't quite know what to do with himself now that it's suddenly permitted. It isn't just that he's worried what Bucky might read into his sketches, if not now then later. (He'll get better. He _will_.) If Steve's mother had seen them, or any of the kids at school, or Peggy, or even the Commandos--maybe they would have wondered at the care taken with each piece, or why there were so many of them, or why it was always Bucky. It wouldn't have ended well. Some days he feels like he dodged a bullet seventy years ago, not leaving any clues behind for history to find, because it doesn't matter that the way he looks at Bucky is okay _now_. He's not even worried Bucky will hate him for it, or walk away. He just doesn't want to see that helpless look Bucky wears when there's something Steve needs and Bucky can't get it, not for love or money.

He's not expecting anything to change, but then Bucky goes and brings it up himself, stares Steve down in that way he always does when he thinks Steve is being too hard on himself, and he has to believe. He can't struggle to give Bucky back his autonomy and then second guess him every time he tries to exercise it.

He still has to be careful what he draws, but who and how much? He's got a free pass for those.

It's possible he goes a little bit overboard.

He draws Bucky standing at the window that afternoon, his sniper's wariness bleeding through the softer look his civvies should have given him, a shadow against the light. He draws Bucky on the couch, taking more time than he should on the loose-limbed sprawl that looks disarmed but hides steel-coiled readiness just beneath. He draws Bucky training, trying new foods, ignoring Stark but slowly relaxing into the poking, prying curiosity that drags Tony back again and again.

He draws them both peering into the guts of Bucky's arm, Bucky with his chin tucked to his clavicle, Tony leaning so close their brows are nearly touching, and can't believe they've come even this far. The only thing that worries him is that Bucky's nightmares are getting worse, but Sam assures him that's a good thing.

"If he's ever going to work through it, he's going to have to start remembering things," Sam says with a shrug. They've all been gathering in the gym on Steve's floor for the past few days, partially to hang out and partially so Steve can get Bucky thinking without driving him nonverbal. He won't talk to Sam directly, won't even listen to him; Sam's a little too good at what he does, and Steve swears Bucky thinks it's mind control. Instead Sam pretends to spot Steve on weights so they can talk where Bucky can overhear. "Whether it's the working through it or the remembering, it's bound to shake things up in the attic, and that often comes out in dreams."

They've taken to sharing a bed--Steve's is Bucky's preference--and whether it's the familiar smell of both their bodies on the sheets or the comfort of having a willing victim to kick and elbow and flop onto in the night, Bucky only wakes him up with a shout, not an attack. Minus the shouting, it's just like old times, and Steve relearns the trick of sleeping through anything but what doesn't belong. And Bucky belongs.

If it's a little difficult to go to sleep with the sound of Bucky's deep, even breathing in his ears, he's the only one that needs to know that.

***

He hears what Wilson tells Steve about his dreams, but they're not his biggest concern. They're not something he can talk about anyway. He'll get it wrong, let it slip that he's bothered about the wrong thing in the wrong way or to the wrong degree. His memories upset him, but it's the numbers, not the faces, and how few of them he recalled until he was given time to put himself back together. He's only just realizing how much they've taken out of him now that it's jostling for space to get back in.

The nightmares aren't ideal, but they're familiar. He's had them before, mostly just before he froze or just before waking on a table, always mercifully short. Being with Steve helps ground him, but that's a problem too. Steve smells the same, grumbles the same curses in his sleep when Bucky's knees and elbows try to occupy the same space, but that just reminds him of how long the want inside him has been brewing.

He hasn't tried anything he shouldn't. He tries not to even think it. The little voice that tells him to say this, don't say that--it gets riled at him every time he thinks about his captain's hands, about things he doesn't even have words for. Other people have looked at him like they might know the words he needs, but if it's ever happened, that's a memory he can't call back. He suspects he wouldn't want their words anyway.

The thing inside him that nudges and pushes and sometimes curdles his guts with anger: it knows. But it's not sharing.

He heads up to Tony's lab one day alone--Steve calls it an accomplishment--to find a stranger sitting with Tony, their heads bent together over the prototype arm Tony's talked Bucky into letting him build. The new guy isn't particularly tall or particularly young--he's got threads of grey all through his still-dark hair, looks more like an office worker than a fighter--but his eyes are lit with fierce intelligence, and the faint lines around his mouth are from a wry half-smile that never quite fades.

"Hey," Tony calls when he notices Bucky, "Sergeant Winter!"

Bucky's mouth twitches. He wonders if Tony knows that General Winter was the Russians' unbeatable ace in the hole against the threat of Nazi invasion. Probably; Tony knows a lot more about a much broader range of subjects than he tends to let on.

"Come over here and meet the other resident genius," Tony invites when Bucky hesitates. He hasn't met anyone new without Steve standing by since he came here.

"I still don't live here," the new guy reminds Tony. It sounds like a well-worn argument.

"Pfft. Semantics," Tony says with a snort. "I'll wear you down. Bucky, this is Bruce Banner--Bruce, Bucky Barnes, yes that one." Banner doesn't look surprised, though his head tilts in friendly curiosity. It's clear someone already gave him the briefing. "Bruce has some ideas on how to increase sensation in the new arm. You should pull up a chair, hear him out."

He's heard about Banner as well, knows not to take it personally when Banner doesn't offer his hand. Ever since Steve explained Banner's circumstances, he's been wary of meeting the man, not certain whether his control will hold in the face of such a blatant threat. He needn't have worried; there's nothing threatening about the kind face and tired eyes of the man slouching over Tony's workstation. There's irony in seeing the same wariness looking back; he can tell by how still Banner's holding himself that he's bracing for Bucky to trigger the creature inside him.

He nods once and steps away from the door, keeping both hands relaxed and loose at his sides. "I appreciate the help," he says, grateful the lab is quiet today. He dislikes raising his voice.

"It's my pleasure," Banner replies. His smile seems genuine enough. "Tony's told me a bit about your situation. I'm glad to help however I can."

Tony gives him an unrepentant smirk when Bucky glances his way. When he looks back, Banner's staring at his arm.

"That really is remarkable," Banner says, sliding a pair of wire-framed glasses out of his shirt pocket. "And it functions as well as the original?"

Like Tony, Banner loses his fear fast, though he never loses his caution. Bucky's gotten used to how aggressively tactile Tony is--Tony _has_ to be able to touch him, even cause him pain; it makes sense to defuse that bomb--but Banner's respectful reserve is calming. He even meets Bucky's eyes once with a quirked brow, silently asking if he should cause a distraction or rein Tony in.

"No, but see?" Tony says, poking a delicate screwdriver into the workings of Bucky's arm to shift a bundle of wires out of the way. He's stationed himself behind Bucky's left shoulder, hand braced just below Bucky's nape as he leans over to demonstrate. The sidelong grin he gives Bucky is both conspiratorial and pleased, one he knows--somehow--from the inside out. _Play along_ , Tony's asking, and…he gets it. Tony's not standing so close because he's forgotten that Bucky is dangerous. It's because every moment Bucky allows this blatant encroachment on his personal space, some tight, unhappy thing eases from Banner's face, leaving only curiosity behind.

For an instant they're too close, too much. He's had to hold himself still and safe for scientists before, and he's not...he's not _that_ anymore. He's not an experiment, not a robot, not a machine. And then Tony leans on him even harder, and Banner finally moves in for a better look, warm brown eyes tipping up to meet his with a silent question. _Is this okay?_

He reaches over with his right hand to hike the rolled sleeve of his tee up higher, turning his shoulder out to give them better access. The realization that he'll have to be _careful_ is not a new one, but the parameters have changed again. He has to not hit Tony, no matter how often he deserves a sock in the jaw. He has to not plot ways to get rid of Wilson, who doesn't mean to remind him of the white coats who asked question after question only to pry that much deeper into his head. He has to not offend Pepper, because someone he owes an unbreakable allegiance to taught him better than that, and he has to look out for Steve in all things, because the idiot won't do it himself.

He can be careful of Bruce Banner too.

Steve is reading when Bucky returns to their floor, curled up on the couch and leaning back against the padded arm. When Bucky comes out of the elevator, Steve looks up with a welcoming smile, marking his place in his book. "How'd it go?"

"Fine. I met Banner," he adds. It might be important.

"Bruce is back? That's great," Steve says. "I was hoping you'd get to meet him soon."

"He's going to be helping with the arm Tony's building."

"At least he'll be easier to deal with than Stark," Steve says, shaking his head. He acts like he doesn't realize he's smiling. 

"Stark's fine." He is. He's familiar, though not in the same way Steve is. But Bucky knows deep down how to deal with geniuses who leap from staggering bravery to tactless arrogance in the blink of an eye. He's _prepared_ for Tony, and that feels like a real accomplishment.

"You have rotten taste in Avengers, Buck."

"Nah," he says, shoving his right hand into his pocket. The left doesn't really fit. "You're still my favorite."

Steve lights up with a half-disbelieving laugh, but Bucky's torn. It looks like he got it right this time, but was he supposed to admit that? There's a panic bubbling up in the pit of his stomach that feels like an old friend, and damn it, he's always saying stupid things, things he's going to have to dig himself out of--

(" _Aw, c'mon, Stevie. They're just blind, that's all."_

_"Every girl in New York?"_

_"Must be, or they'd see what a catch you are."_

_"Sure, Buck."_

_"Hey, hey, I'm serious! You're a good man, Steve, the best I know, and there ain't a lot of those around. Look, it's my fault. I got rotten taste in dames, and they've got rotten friends. ‘Course, a nice girl's not going to give me the time'a day, so if you find one, ask if she's got a sister, yeah?"_ )

"Bucky?"

He blinks, and it's the twenty-first century again, far from the run-down apartment they'd shared with the sticky window and the leaky faucet and the tired smell of neglect sweating from the walls.

"Memory," he admits, voice scratchy and soft. He can say that now instead of clamming up, locking his teeth on every thought so that no one can take them away.

"What, you remembered that I'm your favorite?" Steve teases, purposefully light.

"Sure, like I was going to forget that."

Steve's smile is fond, but Bucky is...confused. He doesn't joke with his...he doesn't _joke_. And Steve's got this hopeful shine to his eyes, like he thinks he's finally looking at the old Bucky again, only it's not that simple. He took the name like an order, made these people his new mission, the only one he chose for himself.

_Wrong_ , he (tells himself) hears. _Steve was first._

The hell of it is, he still doesn't know who decided that--whether it was Sergeant Barnes or the kid who fits a name like Bucky, or whether the soldier was here all along. Maybe all Hydra did was set him loose.

"Hey, Buck?"

Maybe there's not enough left of any of the people he's been to tell the difference anymore.

"You're my--"

He's never been so grateful to hear an alarm go off in all his life.

***

Piloting the Quinjet always makes Steve nervous. It's not that he hasn't been trained; it's just that the pit of his stomach is convinced that a plane shouldn't come to a dead stop in midair, not for any reason, even if it was made by a Stark. _Especially_ if it was made by a Stark. He'd almost prefer they take the chopper when their destination is so close, but the Quinjet has better guns, a stronger hull, and there's room inside for Bruce to coax the Other Guy out without flattening the rest of the team.

One good thing about living in New York: he's always on hand for all the invasions. The one thing Steve can't figure out is why it always has to be New York.

"Tony's working on a theorem," Bruce pipes up from the back of the Quinjet, which means Steve was probably muttering that over the headsets. "You should ask him about it; the proofs he's been coming up with are pretty elegant."

" _Elegant? They're brilliant_ ," Tony insists over the comm, looping them in the Iron Man suit. " _Also insidious. Turns out there's a perfectly valid reason why New York is the first one hit when the universe wants us to pick a door, any door_ \--"

" _I've got a visual_ ," Sam cuts in. More maneuverable than Tony, he'd flown ahead to scout their targets, see whether the initial reports from the police match the reality of the situation. As they come in closer, Steve spots him weaving through buildings up ahead, the flash of sunlight on his new wings drawing bright trails in his wake. " _They look like some kind of arthropods; a few too many legs, but those exoskeletons look tough. So far I'm looking at small, medium and extra_ \--Jesus!"

"Falcon!" Steve clenches his hands on the controls as he sees Sam shoot straight up with his wings clapped to his sides, straining for altitude. A yellow-orange gout of liquid spits after him, crests almost at his heels, then patters down in a thick rain, enough to flood a street. "What's your--"

" _Fine, I'm fine! Mama Bug just tried to throw up on me! Man, that's disgusting...._ "

"Is it--"

" _Eating through the pavement? Sure is_."

Steve wants to glance back at their silent fifth, but he can't afford the distraction. There'd been no discussion of Bucky joining them; when Steve had headed for the elevator, Bucky had gotten in right alongside him, ignoring him pointedly when Steve tried to ask what he thought he was doing. When Bucky had stepped out ahead of him into the Quinjet's hidden bay, Tony had turned to look, cocked a brow, and said, "Hey, Sergeant Winter--need a suit?"

The new tactical suit fits Bucky a little too well, like Tony had had it commissioned weeks ago. With both of Bucky's arms covered, minus the mask and with his hair pulled back in a tail, he doesn't look much like the man who'd terrorized DC. He can't argue that Bucky isn't in peak physical condition; he's watched Bucky train. It doesn't worry him that Bucky might not be up to the fight. It bothers him that Bucky had just assumed he'd be in it, like it was expected of him.

" _Got a bead on the portal_ ," Tony calls out, dragging Steve's mind back to business. " _Not seeing anything that could be powering it, though. Whatever's keeping this thing stable has to be on the other side_."

"Is anything coming through at the moment?"

" _Negative. Someone did a lousy job of picking the landing zone, and the big one's still blocking the area. But while they're distracted...I might have an answer for this back at the tower. It hasn't been tested yet, but after the Chitauri thing, I figured coming up with a few strategies to close an interdimensional gate might be a good idea. Got a team that can have it here in twenty minutes tops._ "

Steve has to swallow a rush of pride. Stark's not _asking_ , but he's asking. Not long ago Tony would have made the call himself and explained later.

"Anything you've got, bring it on. In the meantime, let's try to push them back through the portal. If we can get them to retreat, they'll be less likely to take to the sewers and breed an army." He's joking, but only just. The idea of an alien force gaining a permanent toehold on Earth is one of his more common nightmares.

" _Pretty sure the alligators will get them if they go the sewer route_ ," Tony says, " _but you're the boss_."

Steve frowns. "They're still having the alligator problem?" He remembers Bucky telling him about that back in the 30s, gleefully playing up every detail. He'd thought Bucky was having him on, except that other people were telling the same story.

Everyone goes quiet until Bruce chuckles. "Remind me to introduce you to Snopes dot com."

Steve shakes his head. It's going to be one of _those_ stories, then.

"Save it for later, people," he orders, ignoring the incredulous sound Tony makes, a mutter that might have been: _Did he really say later to the alligators_? "I'm setting her down. Iron Man, Falcon--keep ‘em occupied. Let us know if anything new starts coming through that portal. Doc, see if Hulk can convince the small fry to run home. Sergeant, cover us. I'll start driving them back toward the center. Get ready to move."

The streets below are filled with abandoned cars slewed in every direction, a solid bottleneck that keeps him from landing as close as he'd like. He ends up setting the Quinjet down on the roof of a parking garage not far from the perimeter, swallowing the unsettled lurch in his stomach as the thrusters cut out and the VTOL rotors kick in. A muffled grunt from Bruce at his back is followed by Hulk's low rumble as they land, but Hulk sounds curious rather than annoyed.

"Hulk, right?" Bucky asks, deadpan.

Remembering too late that Bucky hasn't seen the Hulk yet, Steve twists in his seat even as he's shutting the jet down, heart in his mouth. Bucky's staring, head cocked a little to the right, but Hulk's just staring right back. He probably shouldn't be surprised; Bucky's one of the few people who wouldn't be intimidated into posturing or panicking, two things Hulk picks up on fast.

"Uh, that's Bucky, Hulk," Steve calls back to them. "He's a friend."

The Hulk nods warily, head lowered between broad, braced shoulders, but the half-hopeful way he peers at Bucky is encouraging. Hulk's realized that he likes making new friends; it's just that most people disqualify themselves in the first few seconds by screaming and running away.

Bucky practically disappears the minute they leave the jet, and Steve has to remind himself not to go running after him. As much as Steve hates being reminded of why, Bucky's probably seen more action than he has at this point; he knows what he's doing.

"Give me a lift down?" Steve asks Hulk, determinedly not thinking of the five-story drop in relation to Bucky. Hulk gives him a fierce grin; Hulk's always a little smug when his puny friends ask for his help.

The instant he sets Steve down, Hulk goes loping off, heading straight for the growing commotion up ahead. He looks slow, his gait lumbering, but he's so big he eats up three of Steve's paces with every stride he takes. A few car alarms go off in his wake, but Hulk just shoves the noisiest ones out of his way. Steve winces as a sporty yellow car goes rolling over an SUV to end up on the sidewalk; someone's not going to be happy about that.

The fast popping of small ordnance has Steve picking up the pace; from the sound of it, Tony's deployed some of his shoulder missiles. A dozen blocks ahead, the cars that jam the intersection appear to be crawling; it takes a moment to realize the shiny patches of black and deep blue slipping between empty vehicles belong to armored carapaces the size of a sedan.

Before he can rush to engage, Sam comes tearing around the side of an office building, wings tucked close for minimum drag as he takes the corner like a demon. At forty feet up, he's moving too fast for even Steve's sharp eyes to make out his expression, but his flying is a little more precise than usual, easy grace traded for grim competence.

" _Heads up_ ," Sam warns as a flock of _something_ comes careening around the same corner to follow him. " _Some of these things can fly_!"

The creatures chasing Sam are smaller than their car-sized cousins, look a little like an unholy cross between a manta ray and a lamprey, and they're fast enough to keep up with a jet pack redesigned by Tony Stark. Their dark, mottled skins glisten slickly when they should be dry, and it's that one jarring note that makes the back of his neck prickle. A metallic ticking sound follows them as they go rushing past, but none of them swoop close enough for Steve to suss out where it's coming from. All their attention is fixed on Sam.

" _I blame Hollywood_ ," Tony grumbles to no one and everyone. " _Someone needs to explain to me how space lobsters became technologically advanced enough to build a stargate when all they've got are pinc--shit. Okay, freaking out now._ "

Tony's a master of both under- and overstatement, but Steve doesn't like the sound of that. "Iron Man?" he asks, leaping to the top of a cab to cross a snarled intersection. "What are you--"

He hits one of the cleared strips left behind by Hulk's passing just in time to get his first real look at the invaders. They're big and bulky, with bodies that remind him at first of crayfish until the hunchbacked armor plates of their front halves unlock and unfold. The torso that rises up from each mass of chitin is four-armed, mostly humanoid, but the creatures' small, flat-faced heads look the same as before. Steve's never had so much trouble remembering that he's looking at a person, and even the unslinging of various weapons from close-fitting harnesses doesn't help. He feels as unsettled as Tony sounds, reminded all over again of what Thor has made him forget: that aliens are called that for a reason.

Half a dozen rifles are trained on him in moments, and Steve has just enough time to wonder what sort of ammo to expect--bullets? plasma? _lasers_?--before throwing himself out of the way. The answer is bullets, but the nearest one's right pincer takes a swipe at him for good measure, its reach daunting.

Rolling to his feet, he brings his shield up just as three aliens drop in quick succession, their tiny, armored heads pulping as bullet after sniper's bullet finds its mark. Though he feels guilty for even thinking it, it's like getting a letter from home.

" _Well,_ " Tony drawls over the comm to the low drone of his arm lasers discharging, " _now I wish we'd let them see Big Green transform. For the psychological advantage alone_."

Steve has space to move now, and he doesn't let himself think about the sickening crunch the shield makes as it slams into a carapace. No scream escapes the alien, but suddenly the air is filled with the stench of burning tires, and its huge claws and peeled-back armored plates snap and shiver even as it starts to convulse. The loud clicking is taken up by its fellows, and more of them come boiling up over cars and around corners to make a beeline for him, already centaur-formed with weapons at the ready. The burning tire scent filling the air is layered now with a hint of rotten citrus. He knows he's been marked, and also that he's never going to go out for seafood ever again.

Sam swoops by overhead, turning in midair to fire behind him at a pack of creatures flying close on his tail. There are fewer than before, but the ones that are left are better fliers, slowly closing the gap between them and Sam. Two cut around from the side of another building at Sam's back, shooting up to intercept, only to tumble out of the air in a spray of blood before Sam even notices them.

A solid measure of tension drops from Steve's shoulders. Bucky can be single-minded with his overprotective streak, but never to the detriment of their friends. It's good to know some things haven't changed.

" _Nice assist, Sergeant_!" Sam calls out, sounding as relieved as Steve feels.

" _They're targeting the cap_ ," Bucky growls by way of reply, Brooklyn coming through loud and clear not just in Bucky's words but the snap of his tone. It's the first time Steve's heard the old Bucky's voice in seventy years, and it nearly makes him stumble in mid-swing. " _I'm moving in_."

Steve would like to argue, but they don't have enough people on the ground as it is. He slams his way through the mob trying to crush him by sheer numbers, deflecting bullets into the pack when someone takes a risky shot and using the shield as a battering ram when he's pressed too close. He can hear Hulk bellowing somewhere close-by, something about his feet, but he sounds pissed, not pained. He's not even sure what real pain would sound like in the Hulk's voice, and he never wants to know.

At first he finds himself dodging enemies that fall without warning to tangle everyone's feet, the three round holes of their black, beady eyes joined by a fourth as a bullet burrows deep. They're blown back or collapse where they stand, and if there's always more of them, he somehow always finds just enough room to breathe. When a dark shape drops down beside him, driving a metal fist into a carapace that shatters on impact, Steve doesn't pause to say hello. He only grins to himself, finding it that much easier to keep pressing on, knowing Bucky will have his back no matter what.

Forcing their way to ground zero takes more time than he'd like, but neither Tony nor Sam have given an update on the portal, so for now it must be dormant. It doesn't take long to see why.

The intersection ahead is a shambles. Pitted, wet asphalt smokes under a thin glaze of acid, making the footing treacherous even for the aliens. Empty cars have been shoved aside, some stacked up as if flung--Hulk's doing, maybe, or casualties of Tony's missiles. The portal itself is large enough to be concerning, two stories tall and thirty feet wide, but it's sticking halfway through a building that looks like it might collapse at any second. The grounded aliens seem torn between trying to move the portal and trying to demolish the building around it, but they're a little distracted by the giant in their midst.

Mama Bug is enormous, nearly five stories tall when it rears its front half up, with another fifty feet of broad, segmented body stretching out behind it. It's something like a centipede, only its red and black plates have the textured spikes of a seashell. It would have been a close fit coming through the portal, but that's probably not a coincidence: the troops and the portal apparatus behind it would have been completely covered while it softened up any resistance, and who knew how many more portals were primed to be opened later? Their best hope is to crush this one hard and fast and hope that proves a deterrent.

Rippling in place like a hooked worm, the giant flexes its plates with a rattling snap that sounds like machinegun fire. It's glaring at Hulk, mouthparts grinding furiously as the big guy tears through centaur-soldiers that abandon Steve and Bucky to fling themselves into Hulk's path. Hulk barely pauses at the new onslaught, hurling them through the portal if he doesn't smash them on the spot. Steve can only imagine the panic that must be rising on the other side of the gate, assuming this isn't the whole of the invaders. He doesn't believe for a moment that it is.

"Is that building clear?" Steve asks, eyeing the sagging corner of an insurance center that's about to need its own services. The gate itself is a solid pane of blue-white light crawling with lightning. He can't see the blown-out offices on its other side, and the chunks of concrete that crumble off from above disappear the minute they hit the light, but the cracks running up the side of the tower and the sharp sounds of windows breaking is warning enough.

" _Still getting human heat signatures on the upper floors all through this area_ ," Tony takes a break from blasting aliens to say. " _Either they've done a hell of a job of barricading themselves in, or these guys are too busy with their remodeling project to care about going after small fry_."

"And the big one?" They need to get those civilians out of here, but it's not going to do much good if they just turn them loose in the middle of a firefight.

" _Having trouble finding a weak spot. My weapons are barely touching it, but if we put Hulk on the problem, it's going to melt the rest of the block with that acid attack_."

That explains why Hulk hasn't engaged yet; he wonders what Tony said or did to focus their angry friend's attention elsewhere. Hulk _likes_ smashing giants; Steve's still not sure whether that's for the challenge or because it seems more like a fair fight.

"We need a way to evacuate those civilians--"

" _If you can--damn it_ ," Sam cuts in, slicing a curve through the air as he performs a fast reload of both guns. He still has a half-dozen fliers on his tail, but Bucky looks up, tracks them for half a second, and shoots four out of the air while Sam takes out the last two. " _Yeah, that_ ," Sam says with a laugh. " _Pretty sure that's the last of them, so I've got the civilians if they can get to the upper floors. Got a PA system in that suit, Iron Man?_ "

" _Affirmative; I am a toaster_ and _an entertainment system. ETA of two minutes for the team with the Gatebuster--they can back you up on the search and rescue once that's in place_."

"Gatebuster?" Steve echoes, vaguely recalling some of Tony's wilder names for his prototype armors. "You're not planning on sending a suit through, are you?"

" _And risk space lobsters getting their hands on my sweet, sweet intellectual property_?" Tony scoffs. " _Not a chance. The Gatebuster's a gun. By which I mean cannon. By which--oh, shit_ \--"

Steve doesn't know if Tony can smell anything inside the suit, but in the instant before Mama Bug lunges toward Hulk, the entire street is filled with the reek of rancid citrus and smoking tar. With its hundred legs, it glides forward at a pace that's simultaneously too smooth and too busy, but it doesn't have to cover much ground to be in range.

"Hulk!" Steve and Tony yell in unison, but it's too late. Mama Bug rears back again and spits like a fire hydrant, a gout of yellow-orange bile drenching Hulk and the alien soldiers that surround him. Smelling trouble, the soldiers had pulled back into their carapaces before their heavy hitter moved, hiding tough blue and black skin beneath their armored plating. Hulk has no such protection, green skin blistering and smoking as the acid hits.

" _We're evacuating the area_ ," Tony yells over Hulk's furious bellow, the suit's PA system nearly enough to drown out the chugging thump of approaching helicopters as well. " _Get to the roof, people--we're playing Floor is Lava, here. Repeat: get up to the roof for evacuation_!"

Acid streams off Hulk as his skin goes smooth, runs off his hair without sticking as he whips his head around like a dog shaking off water. In four huge strides, he bounds over to Mama Bug and slams both enormous fists into its belly plates; the one he hits makes an awful cracking sound, but it holds. Sharp-pointed feet dig in as Hulk's blow pushes the creature back, acid-softened asphalt furrowing like wet dirt until it braces and comes to a stop. Snaking its front half around with a boneless twist, it belches bile again, infuriating Hulk further.

"We'll run interference if we can get over there," Steve says, eyeing the maze of dry patches and sagging cars scattered across the street uncertainly, "but I don't think our boots are up to this."

" _I'll cook something up for next time_ ," Tony promises distractedly, dodging a stray snap of mandibles as long as he is tall. He tries his lasers again, aiming for the eyes, but he has to power away when the creature snaps its head up, trying to bash him out of the air. " _Damn it, those plates must be coated with something--nothing's that strong in real life_!"

Steve would laugh if he had the breath; despite repeated alien invasions and the discovery of magic as a valid scientific path, Tony is personally insulted by science fiction he hasn't created himself.

Finding spots in the street that aren't already smoking is difficult, but they manage. As Steve rushes forward, Bucky hangs back a little, finding a vantage point on the roof of an SUV half sunk into the street and plugging soldier after soldier until Steve's pressed too hard. Overhead a quartet of helicopters flashing the Stark logo are busy lowering rope ladders for evacuees to climb, but the people manning the choppers don't look much like security, and the helicopters are armored gunships, not a rich man's toys.

"When you said you had a team...?" Steve begins, blocking the sweep of a heavy pincer with his shield. Before the alien soldier can bring the other one up, Bucky reaches over and dislocates the bottom half with his metal hand.

" _Remember what I said about hiring ex-agents_?"

Steve grunts noncommittally, but he can't say it was a bad idea. He trusts Tony to do a better job than SHIELD had of weeding through possible plants, that's for certain.

The choppers continue to circle, plucking civilians out of the line of fire, but none of them seem to be carrying Tony's project. That arrives with the squeal of folding metal and a series of purposeful collisions as a massive armored vehicle bulldozes its way to the edge of the fight, slewing around to present its rear end and backing another few yards over softened asphalt. Heavy, plated tires sink an inch or two into the street, but either the acid has diluted to less potent levels or the giant truck's treads are proof against it. 

Steve glances at Bucky, wondering if one of them should fall back and protect this new weapon or whether they'll do more good keeping the hostiles busy. Before he can decide, the man riding shotgun jumps down to the street, barking orders as two more black-uniformed men slip out through a door in the side that they close swiftly behind them. They clearly know what they're doing, and as they move around to the back, Steve turns his attention back to the fight just as Hulk lands a staggering blow that breaks one of Mama Bug's mandibles off halfway to its mouth.

When he smells it this time, Steve knows the stench of burning tires is a bellow of pain. The flood of bile the creature spews out isn't a surprise, but the angle--too high, almost completely uncontrolled--catches him off-guard. It overshoots all of them, but where it lands--

The screams at his back aren't fear or pain alone. They're agony and horror, the way a victim caught in a fire sounds, and they cut off in a wet smear like nothing he's ever heard before. When he whips around to check on Tony's team, he finds three men on the ground, barely recognizable as they twitch and go still. The heavy back doors of the transport are slowly melting in thick drips, the rear tires bubbling. Inside, several voices are yelling out names, demands for a status report, anything.

Someone yells, " _Sergeant_!" as the side door swings open.

On Steve's left, Bucky flinches hard. Steve gets one look at his stricken expression before Bucky's off like a shot, yelling, "I got this!" over his shoulder as he sprints for the truck. The woman leaning out searching for her comrades falls back inside with a curse as Bucky dives in past her, seconds before the back doors are kicked open. The mother of all rocket launchers sits behind Bucky, surrounded by six operatives staring at him in varying degrees of shock. "Get that fucker, and we'll handle the gate!" Bucky yells, waving Steve on one-handed, his other hooked on a handhold set into the wall.

Steve takes him at his word, rushing to join the others as Bucky shouts an order to change position, and fuck the tires, they're going to be rolling on their rims in a minute anyway. That sharp Brooklyn twang is music to Steve's ears, and even if it's gone again once this is over, hearing it now is enough.

Mama Bug's armor ripples as Steve closes the distance, rattling out a deafening order to the hostiles that remain--or so he thinks, until fresh troops come pouring through gate, guns at the ready. Tony notices them first, firing off another volley from his shoulder cannons while Steve takes Hulk's offer of a boost by jumping up into an outstretched hand. He shoots up like he has wings of his own as Hulk tosses him, tucking himself into a roll as he reaches head-height on their target and grabbing on to a nubby spike near its foremost segment. Far below, the armored truck whips around for a better vantage point, one less likely to melt out from under them, and squeals to a stop.

Slamming the edge of the shield in the narrow seam between two plates, Steve takes a crack at engineering their own weak spots while Hulk hammers on Mama Bug from below. The scent of burning tires grows stronger as chips of shell-plating fall away, and seconds later he has to devote all his energy to hanging on when the monster slews itself around, trying to shake him off. He looks for Bucky despite himself--there's really nothing else he can do until he gets his feet back under himself again--and stares in surprise at the six agents pulling the device out of the truck, setting it up in the street as it drills itself in deep. He'd thought it was bolted to the bed of the truck, but apparently he was wrong.

"Iron Man," he calls out, shaking his head when Tony looks back at him. He's not looking for an assist, not yet. "How many shots are in that thing?"

" _Wrong question, Cap_ ," Tony says, searing through a line of soldiers. " _It's designed to two-shot its entire payload. After that it takes a few minutes to reload_."

"How many minutes?"

" _Best time? Three minutes, six seconds_."

Steve hopes they can do it in one try, but three minutes will have to be enough. "Sergeant," he says, finding it stranger to call his old friend by his legitimate title than he ever has bandying ridiculous superhero names about. "You copy that?"

" _Loud and clear_ ," Bucky says, standing between Tony's team and the alien soldiers still pouring through the gate, picking off anything that comes too close.

"Stand by for lock-on!" he hears a woman shout, echoed faintly over the comm through Bucky's headset. When Steve glances down, he sees a slim figure half-bent behind the device, her hands flying as a pair of two-man teams hand off ammunition and load it into place. Their sixth does his best to cover Bucky; that mostly consists of aiming far, far away from him. Bucky's too fast, too strong to be pressed for long. "Target locked! Thirty seconds to load!"

Steve pushes himself up the instant he can and works the shield in deeper, heaving up on the lip of it in an effort to wedge vast plates apart. He succeeds in tipping down the creature's head, but only a thin sliver of its armor breaks off at his attempt.

"Twenty!"

He tries again, bracing his feet as the monster writhes under him, jolting under Hulk's steady blows.

"Ten! Sergeant--"

" _Fall back_!" Bucky orders, but when he dives out of the way and rolls to his feet, he doesn't leave it to chance; he pauses to grab his backup and drags the other man along with him.

"Ready!" the two men loading the gun shout in unison, lunging for the truck only to pull out more ammunition.

" _Fire_!" Tony barks before anyone else can, and Bucky lets him have that, all his attention fixed on the tide of soldiers coming their way.

Steve expects missiles, but the Gatebuster's first volley is a wide repulsor blast that mows down everything in its path, boring a straight line to its target. The missiles follow close on its heels, shooting through the gate in a swarm. The sounds of their detonation are muffled and staggered, as if they have a secondary targeting system that only kicks in once they've reached the other side; it's the kind of thing Tony would think up, thorough as he is in all things.

" _Reload_!" Bucky yells to shouts of acknowledgment; this time the teams are wearing gloves, shoving fresh ammo into chambers still heated from the previous blast.

The portal isn't gone, but it flickers, cutting out while a small group of wounded soldiers are staggering through. Steve _sees_ what happens next, but his brain can't parse it. He's left with a shaky impression of something turning inside out and collapsing at the same time, blood and flesh and bits of chitin reconfigured in impossible tangles. It looks like the portal will collapse on its own, but when a chunk of the building it intersects is ripped away, Steve realizes it just might take a few souvenirs with it.

It's like trying to keep his feet in an earthquake when Mama Bug's plates ripple beneath him, sounding out another sharp order. There's not many soldiers left now that reinforcements aren't coming through, but there's enough if they only have one target.

Flattening to the ground and nearly crushing Hulk in the process, Mama Bug and every last soldier left on the field turns to the Gatebuster and the man planted yet again right in front of it.

"Target locked!" the technician calls out again, her voice steady and sure. "Ninety seconds to load!"

Steve nearly loses his grip when Mama Bug takes off like a freight train, but he hangs on through the first jolt and then forces himself up, scrambling over blunt, irregular spikes to make his way up to the thing's head. Tony circles around behind him, firing at the tiny hole Steve managed to pry between its plates, and that distracts it. It flinches, curls in on itself for an instant, just long enough for Steve to hammer the edge of the shield down into an eye already scuffed grey by Tony's earlier attack.

This time it works, some heavy coating shattering like glass as half of Steve's arm is buried in an organic soup.

"Iron Man!" he yells as he gathers himself to jump. Tony will take one look at the mess he's left and know exactly what to do with it.

" _Good enough_ ," Bucky snaps as Steve jumps clear. " _Fire that thing and haul ass, people_!"

Rolling to his feet, Steve sprints to join Bucky, tearing through the soldiers that get in his way. He watches the technician pop her head up just long enough to make sure neither of them are in the way before slamming her hand down on a switch, the entire team looking back over their shoulders as they retreat. The repulsor blast misses Steve by a mile, but Bucky doesn't look happy until the second round of missiles fly, vanishing through the portal just before it cuts out again. It only comes back up for half a second, spewing half a ton of pulverized rock and twisted metal across the street before fading out for good.

He'd count it as a victory, but Mama Bug is still coming, mouth gaping wide even as Tony wheels around in front and lines up a killing shot.

Steve gathers himself to throw the shield to distract the thing, but Hulk's already there, leaping up to smash two huge fists into its already damaged mouthparts. Something crunches, but the real damage comes as its head jerks up, a trapped gout of acid spewing from the edges of its forced-shut mouth. Writhing, it gapes its mouth open on a silent scream, but its own acid is already eating its way into its flesh through the cracks and open wounds left by the fight, dissolving its flesh from the inside out. The mini-rockets Tony unloads right into its skull are probably a mercy.

Sam gives a whoop as the giant collapses, pausing to pump a fist in the air with one final office worker clinging to his neck. The lady squeaks and promptly kicks him in the shin, and that makes Tony laugh even as he's swooping away, picking off any stragglers the rest of them might have missed.

There's something odd in Bucky's eyes when Steve turns back to clap him on the shoulder. He looks like a man afraid to move, like the slightest twitch will topple him for good. "All right, there?" Steve asks, trying to keep his voice light. He's not expecting miracles, and he'll kick himself forever if Bucky gets the notation that he is.

"Sure," Bucky says, voice cracking in the middle. It makes it impossible to tell whether he's returned to the flat tone of the soldier or not.

Steve just smiles and grips his shoulder tighter until Bucky relaxes into his touch.

Stark finds him as the cleanup crews arrive, which is usually their cue to go. When Tony takes off his helmet to talk privately, Steve braces himself for the worst, but Tony looks amused. "So did we just meet Sergeant Barnes?" he asks, tipping his head to the left. Bucky's gone silent again, sticking close but not too close, studying the half-collapsed insurance building with professional curiosity.

Steve nods, throat going stupidly tight.

"You know it's probably not permanent, right?"

Steve nods again, and Tony gives him a look, one of those strange, wincing smiles that says he knows he's being an asshole, but if someone has to do it, it might as well be him. He cracks a moment later, the hunch of one shoulder magnified by the suit, face softening with the optimism Steve always forgets is as much a part of him as the wary sarcasm.

"Then again, it's probably not over, either. He'll be back."

He doesn't need Tony to tell him that, but he'll take the second opinion all the same.

***

Bucky's pretty sure his silence is upsetting the hell out of Steve, who's turned over the Quinjet to Wilson in favor of sitting with Bucky. He's still quiet as they make their way home. His hands are not steady. His mind is _too_ steady. He wants to panic--if Sergeant Barnes is _here_ , then what room does that leave for the soldier?--but the most he can manage is disbelief. Sergeant Barnes hadn't felt like something _other_ even in the thick of things. The soldier's desire to complete the mission at any cost had floated seamlessly beneath the sergeant's drive to protect his men, all wound up with Bucky's need to follow Steve no matter where they ended up. They'd worked seamlessly together, got the job done and kept the right people safe, and everyone involved seems pretty pleased with the outcome. So maybe it doesn't matter so much, all the things he's lost. He still has enough pieces left to make himself someone useful. Someone he thinks he _wants_ to be.

A sudden thought hits him that brings his head up sharp, turning to the left to meet Steve's questioning look. "They all made it out, right? Without us? Dum Dum and Gabe and...everyone." He knows this--he's sure he does--but he's still afraid to hear that what he knows is wrong.

"Yeah, Buck," Steve says with a fond smile. "They all made it. Even Peggy and Howard."

"Howard...?" Bucky echoes, one corner of his mouth turning up in a helpless smile. "Shit, I do know a Howard, don't I? I keep hearing that name in my head, but...." Steve's starting to look a little strained, and that bothers Bucky. Hunting for something to distract Steve, he says, "You know, it's funny, but...Tony looks a lot like--" Tony. This is important, he realizes, smile falling away in confusion.

Steve swallows hard. "Tony is Howard's son, Bucky."

"His son?" That can't be right. "Howard's not old enough...to...."

Howard. Howard--

("-- _Stark's not going to keep for much longer. Isn't there anything you can do to speed things up?"_

_"Have you looked at the state of this thing? Should've known they were going to wreck it before handing it over. Some fucking asset_.")

Bucky sucks in a shuddering breath, aware only now that he's stopped breathing. "Oh, Jesus." His hands are not steady. His mind is not steady. Steve takes him by the shoulder, but that doesn't steady him either. It only holds him together while he remembers. "Hydra had him killed, didn't they? I...I heard them talking about it. I _remember_ that. Everything was so weird right around then, it just...stuck out."

"What did, Buck?" Steve asks gently. Bucky's still got his headset on, and he hears someone breathe out a long, slow gust, but he can't...he can't think who. He can't think of that person right now.

"It was...I don't know when, but they had a lot of jobs for me all of a sudden, one right after another," he says in a rush. His voice sounds strange even to him, wavering between atonal flatness and a pained moan in a once-familiar accent, but he can't stop now. "Only they were real careless about it--about me. Too much time out of the freezer, not enough wipes. I must've killed a dozen handlers one day before they got me back under, and when I woke up, everybody was speaking English.

"And they were mad, Steve," he says to his clenched fists, "real mad, ‘cause now that they had me, I wasn't in any fit state to work. They had to wait until I fixed myself, and they thought I had to do that out of the freezer, and there was someone breathing down their necks the whole time. And they kept saying I was useless," he grits out, throat closing up, "a--a useless expense for an easy target, ‘cause...."

"Buck--"

"'Cause they wanted to m-make me do it. As a test. Only time ran out. Jesus, Steve. They would've made me...Jesus _Christ_."

Steve slides out of his seat and goes to his knees before him, making himself small and unthreatening as he reaches up to pull Bucky's head down. "Breathe," he murmurs, settling Buckys' head to his shoulder, hugging back as Bucky latches on and tries to shake himself apart. "Just breathe, Buck. I got you. I know."

He's mastered himself by the time they come in for a landing, but it's a near thing. The others are kind enough to pretend to ignore him, all except Tony, who meets him with the helmet off when Bucky disembarks. Tony's eyes are red, but all he does is clap Bucky's shoulder with a brief, friendly squeeze before walking off alone. Bucky supposes that means he's forgiven, but he's not sure he deserves it.

Getting out of the tactical suit is a relief, not because it reminds him of his time as the soldier but because he wants to be clean. They hadn't always bothered with scrubbing him up too nice, and after Hydra, the war, growing up dirt poor, the marvel of inexhaustible hot water is still one of his best reasons for getting up in the morning. Steve just leaves him to it, sensing he doesn't want to talk right now, and goes off to take his own shower. By the time Bucky feels ready to face the world again, Steve's had time to clean up, get dressed, and throw together an enormous meal comprised of nine parts comfort food and one part dessert. It's a meal designed to relax a body right into a coma, and Bucky just thanks him and digs in.

He already knows he's going to have a rough night of it, and he'll take his comfort where he can get it.

When he'd first started having the nightmares, he hadn't understood why they were nightmares at all. The emotions just weren't there. Now he knows _why_ the memory of a thin young technician being forced to his knees makes him burn with rage. He remembers the man leaning over him as he woke, murmuring a string of incomprehensible numbers into his ear--

("... _three two five five seven oh three eight. Remember. If no one comes for you, you must go to them_.")

\--and getting caught. They'd handed Bucky a gun once he was unfrozen enough to stand, gave him the termination order. He'd lifted the gun. Breathed in.

He wakes with every muscle clenched before he can pull the trigger, rolls over to curl in on himself and hits a solid body instead. _Steve_ , he realizes before he can panic. It's just Steve, who turns without waking entirely, still exhausted from the day's fighting, and wraps him up in a warm embrace that holds him together through this memory as well.

Rebel, sympathizer, plant, operative--whoever that technician had been, he'd tried to bring Bucky back to himself. Someone had _tried_. He hadn't realized he'd been important enough to anyone but Steve for someone to do that.

He wakes three more times that night, and Steve's still got him each time. It's a wonder Bucky doesn't break Steve's nose at least once, because the big lug has tucked Bucky's face into the hollow of his throat and keeps nuzzling into his hair. It helps, though; just smelling Steve keeps him a little bit grounded, makes the crash of waking that much less disorienting. He thinks wistfully of burrowing even closer, but he doesn't want to borrow trouble. What he's got is enough.

Bucky's awake before Steve is, which is something of a first. It's not that he needs more sleep than Steve; it's just that sleep is such a novel pleasure these days, he tries to hang on to it as long as he can. He feels Steve go still as he realizes how close they are, but then Steve relaxes all at once, arms tightening to haul Bucky in for a quick hug.

"Octopus," Bucky accuses against the warm skin of Steve's throat and feels the laugh that rumbles through the body he's all but plastered against.

"Guess it's my turn," Steve says cheerfully enough. "You know, this may be the first time I haven't needed to have your knee surgically removed from my spine."

"And it only took you seventy years."

Steve laughs again, but it's softer, quieter. His hand shifts to rest at the back of Bucky's neck for a moment, and then he rolls away with a yawn.

"'M going to get a shower. Want anything special for breakfast?" Steve asks as he sits up.

_Are we going anywhere_? Bucky wants to ask. He doesn't want to be slowed down if he has to fight. If he slows down, holds back, he'll be corrected. He shouldn't be offering opinions at all.

"Biscuits and gravy," he says, burrowing his face into Steve's pillow. Not because it's Steve's. It's just there, is all. "With sausage in. And lots of pepper."

Bucky knows exactly why that makes Steve lean down to press their heads together, brow to temple, for a long, long moment. He's feeling pretty pleased with himself as well.

He lets himself drift for a few minutes after Steve leaves the room, but now that he's actually awake, he doesn't feel like going back to sleep. Pushing himself up, he shamelessly claims Steve's side of the bed and all of the pillows as he sits back against the headboard. He's lost count of the number of times he's awakened to find Steve sitting in just that spot, watching over him while he sleeps. Steve's usually drawing, but that's been true for ages. It's only gotten worse now that Bucky's told him--

"Huh."

Steve's been drawing him for weeks now, but Bucky's never seen a single one.

Steve's latest sketchpad is sitting right there on the nightstand, a pencil laid neatly across it. As early ago as yesterday, it would never have occurred to Bucky to touch it, and even now he feels a little guilty for pulling it over to him. Steve's never minded Bucky looking before, but this feels different. He's not sure what he's going to see, what he wants to see, when he opens the cover. Maybe Steve's been drawing the old Bucky, the one he knew, the one he misses. Maybe all he'd needed Bucky for was to refresh his memory.

His stomach churns as he opens the unlined notebook, but what he sees isn't what he expects. The first two pages are still lifes, but it's not the old Bucky looking back at him on the third page in. The Bucky Steve's drawn isn't even looking; it's that time Steve drew him at the window, and it's clearly him, the soldier, though his clothes would have loaned themselves better to the sergeant.

He flips the page and it's him on the couch, watching the artist with a too-blank expression and too-intense eyes. It's the soldier again, but...there's something off about it. Not off about him, except that it's too much him. For all that it's quickly sketched, the level of detail is the same throughout, where he would have expected to see less time wasted on the arm. It's not part of Steve's Bucky, but...there it is. Not the centerpiece, but not forgotten, either.

Flip. In the gym, beating the crap out of a sandbag. Flip. At the kitchen table, poking at takeaway sushi. Drinking hot chocolate. Curled up with a book. Letting Tony mess with his arm.

He stops on one of him sleeping, and it's not a silly cartoon this time. He's sprawled out like always, his left arm flung across the bed, and he can just make out the pair of legs it's weighing down. More than half his face is obscured by the pillow and the spill of his hair, but the set of his mouth is peaceful. The softness of it is completely at odds with the power in the shoulders Steve has captured, the muscles stretched across the bared expanse of his back. It makes his cheeks heat to think it, but he looks good--probably better than he really does--which tickles at a memory he can just about--

(" _You're drawing Peggy?"_

_"Jesus, Buck! You scared the life outta me!"_

_"Haven't seen you do many portraits."_

_"It just seems kinda sneaky to draw someone without their permission."_

_"You gonna go apologize, then?"_

_"Huh? Hey, maybe she said yes!"_

_"Which is why you're working from memory here. I mean, Carter's a knockout, but I'm pretty sure she's not that stacked."_

_"Bucky!"_

_"Aw, don't worry about it, Stevie--a little flattery can go a long way!"_

_"It's not flattery if you weren't intending to show it to anyone. Jeez, everybody's a critic."_ )

Bucky frowns, flipping through the sketchbook again. The weird thing is, Steve hasn't added in anything that isn't there. He hasn't drawn him smiling or laughing or with a proper haircut, nothing that could have leaked through from memory, but he's captured the lightness of expression Bucky has only felt, never seen, that only happens around Steve. And maybe Steve has taken a bit of artistic license after all, because the Bucky on these pages isn't just contained, controlled, he's...comfortable. Or maybe that's just how he is around Steve.

It's probably not flattery. Steve just sees him better than he is, the same way he had Peggy, who he'd--

"Well, hell."

He can blame the holes in his memory all he wants, but he's pretty sure he's been an idiot for a lot longer than that.

Steve comes back to the room in an old tee and a pair of comfortable grey sweats, still rubbing at his face with a corner of the towel slung around his neck. He's probably come in looking for socks, but when he sees Bucky with his sketchbook, he stops dead in his tracks.

"I don't remember you drawing me before," Bucky says casually. "Not seriously, anyway."

Steve shrugs, eyes a little too wide. "Uh...you never offered, so...."

"Is this new?" Bucky asks, nodding at the book in his lap. It's open to a random drawing, but it doesn't matter which one it is. They all tell the same story.

"The sketch?" Steve asks with an uncertain smile.

"No."

Steve swallows, both hands clenching on the ends of his towel, but he doesn't back down. "No."

He's not sure whether that's a relief or not. If it had been new, he would have known it was something that was his, just his. And then he would've had to wonder what had been so wrong with him before, to have loved someone his entire damn life without being good enough to be loved back.

"But we never...?"

"No." Steve looks miserable about it, too, which is the part he just doesn't get. He knows he's got a mean poker face now, but surely he hadn't been such a great actor back then.

"Why not?"

Steve just gapes at him for a moment, mouth working silently. "You--you weren't--you're not interested in men--"

"Pretty sure the only one I'm interested in right now is you," Bucky cuts him off, finally turning to sling his legs over the side of the mattress. He has the crazy feeling he's going to have to chase Steve down in a minute, and he wants to be ready. "Guess some things don't change." Like the weird sense of panic that's crawling in the pit of his stomach, even though the little voice (his own) that had been screaming at him to leave the subject alone is completely silent now. Grimacing, he rubs back of neck. "Why is this so hard to talk about?"

"It--it used to be illegal," Steve says blankly, nearly on autopilot. "But--Buck. You never--"

"Never knew you wouldn't deck me, did I?" Steve still looks torn. "I can't get you in trouble anymore?"

"No. Well, yes, but not like...Bucky. You barely know anyone but me. How do you know it's not--"

Bucky snorts. Now he's just making excuses. "Well, I don't want to make time with Tony, and he's giving me a brand new arm. You're just the dumb punk I've been chasing after for years."

Steve's laugh is mostly breath, but something lights up in his eyes that wasn't there before. "Pepper would kill you anyway."

"Pfft. She could do better." He likes Tony, but that's the God's honest truth. "Just so long as I don't gotta fight her for you, I got no beef with Pepper. Anyone else I should worry about?"

Steve shakes his head, grinning hugely. "God, I'd forgotten what you're like when you--"

"See something I want?" Bucky asks, cocking a brow and allowing himself a smirk. It feels natural, not like the sergeant is stepping in to make sure the soldier doesn't screw this up, but like something intrinsic to his being. How to shoot. How to breathe. Steve. "It's like I said: been chasing this one for years. Not going to let him get away now."

"Good to hear," Steve says, finally taking that first step as Bucky holds out his hand. "'Cause he doesn't mind getting caught."

***

Steve wakes to sunlight, brighter than usual, and finds the blinds wide open when he lifts his head to look. They must have been too distracted to close them the night before. Beside him, Bucky's still out like a light, but he deserves it. It's not just the memories that have been coming back; Bucky's starting to feel them the way he should, and sometimes that ends badly. Last night's distraction had been Bucky turning dead white when Steve quoted his mother in her teasing Irish lilt, and he'd had to lead Bucky over to the bed to keep his legs from going out right where he stood. All he'd been able to say was that he'd made the count, made the count but picked the soldiers, as if that were the important thing. He wouldn't say anything else, but Steve can guess. Bucky had sounded so relieved.

Propping his cheek up on his fist, Steve smiles as he admires the play of sunlight across the long form stretched out beside him. Bucky's on his stomach again, left arm flung over Steve's hip, utterly relaxed. He has more than his share of scars, but the cut muscles of his back are a work of art, and the shadows that cup his scapulae and the divots that chase the knobs of his spine make Steve's fingers itch to set them down on paper.

He nearly rolls over to grab his sketchpad, but a stray thought makes him stop.

He's spent a lot of time hiding in his life, behind friendship, his sketchbook, the fear of getting caught. Some of it had even been necessary. And then there's Bucky, who'd combed through circumstantial evidence and his own fractured memories, pieced together enough proof to hope on, and went after what he wanted with a vengeance.

Steve loves drawing Bucky, loves having the excuse to stare as much as he wants, until he knows every line, every shift, every smile, the way Bucky claims to know his guns. But reaching for his sketchpad should _not_ be his first impulse upon waking to find Bucky in his bed.

Rolling closer, he reaches for Bucky instead and chases the sun across his skin until he wakes.


End file.
